The Bridge 5 : Mettle And Steal
by Gojirob
Summary: Mai travels to Omashu to learn why her parents have chosen to stay there after the war. She learns their story from Toph, who is ticked at King Bumi-as is the rest of the city. She also learns that she and Toph have an unwanted common trait.
1. Chapter 1

Mettle And Steal

By Rob Morris

THE CITY-KINGDOM OF OMASHU, THE FIRST YEAR OF THE REIGN OF ZUKO RLF

The great creature lit down with its usual grace relative to its size, just inside the gates of the city. Its passenger jumped off with even more grace. She looked back at her ride.

"Thanks for the lift. Tell Sokka I'll find my own way back, when I leave."

Mai then almost blushed, and quickly scribbled a note, placing it in a pocket near Appa's saddle.

"Sorry-you're pretty intelligent, so I take certain things for granted. Take care."

Carrying a vital message between the renamed Lu Ten Palace and the North Pole's ruler, Appa resumed his journey back to the frozen North.

"One nice thing about you, pal-you're not chatty."

Mai thought of Zuko. Virtually all of his allies were outside the capital. Yet Sokka's recent bout with inspired madness had secured his reign in a number of ways. The Earth Kingdom cities and Water Tribe settlements harassed by the criminals holed up in the now-destroyed Ruin liked that the Fire Lord could clamp down on the guilty as well as the innocent; they also liked the free transit he had declared. Mai also had to hand it to Sokka on the front of returning soldiers. Many of them had all but flown home when Zuko said they could. Others stayed, either loyal to their original oaths of service or having found true homes outside the increasingly restrictive nation they once called home. Zuko RLF was firmly in his throne and reigning as promised, with justice and a healing hand. But just as his sister had proven to still be a teenage girl, so was Zuko a young man without his friends to support him, and she wondered if the effects could prove the same, obvious differences aside.

_*Okay. Aang has promised to be about a bit more. But that's limited. He's an important part of reconstruction. When one of his subjects, willing and historically otherwise, sees that the new Fire Lord can call upon the Avatar to fix that dam or irrigate those crops to avoid famine, it makes a difference. Then again, as Li and Lo just had to say to me before they retired, a Fire Lady with a fat stomach also gave people a good feeling. Subtle, girls-small wonder Azula once listened to you.*_

Wasting time or being bored long would never be one of her strong suits, so Mai approached the first guard station she saw.

"I am Lady Mai, envoy of Avatar Aang and Fire Lord Zuko. I am here to speak to two of your Prisoners Of War from my nation, the former Occupation Governor and his wife."

Mai was patriotic but not impractical. Using Aang's name first had to have some impact on the leery. But the guard was put off for another reason.

"You mean Lord Valtin and Lady Shira? Heck, they're hardly prisoners. Don't even know how we'd get by without them. See this guard station? Brand new materials. All found by Lord Valtin when he did his Master Inventory. See the new vines with Plorthal Blooms on them, covering the outer gates? Lady Shira. Actually gives us something to look at besides the walls. You're not here to take them back, are you?"

"Actually, they're my folks."

That did seem to put the guard off once again, but he checked her credentials and issued her a sash that would stop almost anyone from so much as asking if she was not from around there.

"Okay-anyone want to give the Fire Nation rep some lip? Anyone?"

She wasn't quite ignored, but nor did a mob, small or large, gather near her, and she was not followed. She was, however, found.

"When I heard a disinterested sigh seven blocks off, I kind of knew it had to be you."

Toph was not among the ready friends Mai had made among their former enemies, but this was not the result of lingering or new enmity. It was part of a slightly similar outlook that said you didn't have to be best friends with absolutely everyone instantly-unlike say, Ty Lee.

"Toph, can you answer a question?"

"I can try-but maybe you better write it down first."

Mai stared so hard, the Earth-bender could feel it.

"Ouch. Okay-even Sokka doesn't fall for that one anymore. Ask."

"Yeah-are my folks really accepted here?"

"You don't know this story?"

Mai shrugged, then realized that, short of the possible vibrations, this was pointless before Toph.

"I-kind of got that King Bumi put them under his personal protection after the fall-well, our fall anyway-and that maybe they stayed after Ozai fearing that Zuko wouldn't be long on the throne. I guess I'm here to tell them it's safe to come back."

Actually, Mai had heard six or seven different things about this situation, and part of her trip had been to finally resolve which of them, if any, was true.

"Is it really safe? I remember hearing this huge boom coming from that way, and I felt some of the heat from the light on my face. People here said it was like a new sun being born."

"That was Sokka. He created a new weapon-it's a long story."

"I'll bet. Our boy makes boom-boom-uhh-not that kind. What's he doing for an encore?"

"That's classified. Now-about that story?"

Toph nodded.

"I'd just as soon tell it-what I know, anyway. My own stay here...ah. Well, I guess it started on the Day Of Black Sun..."

_**SOME MONTHS PRIOR**_

Governor Valtin saw his troops fleeing the city. He saw the Earth Kingdom natives re-enter it.

"How bad is it?"

Before Valtin could respond to his wife's question, he saw the massive-and time and resource consuming-statue of his Fire Lord first disfigured and then sent plummeting over the side of the cliffs just outside Omashu.

"Shira-my position as Fire Nation Governor of New Ozai may have to be reconsidered."

"Ridiculous! Our control over the city is as plain as the proud flags that flutter-"

She looked out the window.

"-that flutter to the ground and are stomped on. We-we have to evacuate!"

"It may be a bit late for that."

"Define a bit late."

Earth-Benders burst through the doors of their private chambers, and soon had them surrounded on all sides. Valtin shrugged at his wife.

"Do I really have to?"

Several hours later, Valtin and Shira were taken from their holding cell and presented before King Bumi. He stared ahead at the pair.

"You have an infant son. Where is he?"

Valtin found the courage to speak.

"I told your people-I don't know. I assumed you were keeping him from us."

Shira was openly crying.

"Please-he's only a baby!"

Bumi rubbed his chin.

"Well, this is embarrassing. I mean, someone has to know where the little firebug's gotten to, right?"

Bumi looked honestly concerned, while Shira and Valtin were having the worst day ever. Then, dust came down from the upper rafters. Bumi was the first to look up and see the tiny crawling figure.

"Enterprising little fella, isn't he?"

Shira screamed and ran beneath the spot Tom-Tom was very high above. When the soldiers seemed set to stop or strike her, ladies of the court stood between this.

"The-the Avatar said that he did this-but I didn't believe him."

Bumi harumphed.

"That's a fine thing! Aang may be a little uptight and sometimes a bit dense-and that whole vegetarian thing is just eerie-ehhhh-but he never lies!"

Women who had likely been prepared to run Shira and her husband through mere moments ago now helped the hysterical mother up. One pointed at the rafters.

"Will someone please get the baby down?"

Bumi sniffed.

"Well, he got up there, so he must know how...ohhh, alright!"

The old man cast off ceremonial robes he didn't care for anyway, and rose slowly on a column of Earth, till he was up at the same level as Tom-Tom.

"Say-this is actually pretty nice. Good call, pal."

Bumi got off his column, walked onto the large rafter, grabbed the little boy-and lay back to take a nap, with Tom-Tom snuggled against his chest.

"Heh-he-little guy's got my beard...zzzzzzzz."

Shira and the women supporting her fainted. Valtin asked his escort officer a question.

"I know my position-but is this normal?"

The officer closed his eyes and looked like a man with a headache.

"Our king is-completely insane."

Valtin saw that his son was safe, and tried to use that to calm himself.

"Oh, I could tell you stories about Ozai, from when we were kids-except that would be treason. But if I could-well then."

A three hour vigil saw the pair down, and Tom-Tom back in his frantic mother's arms.

"Well, the kid's back. All's well that ends well. G'night everyone!"

The escort waved his arms.

"Majesty-the former Governor and his family-what should we do?"

Bumi nodded.

"Let em' go. We don't ransom here in Omashu. Always get paid in livestock, anyway."

The officer shook his head.

"The Fire Nation troops have all retreated, and you smashed the only bridge, which will be weeks before it can be restored. The cliffside is too fragile to bear an earth bridge-it has to be wood-wood of a certain type."

Bumi sighed.

"Okay-so Ex-Governor-what do you do besides ex-governing? I've got that racket pretty much locked up."

"But-won't we be breaking rocks?"

"We're Earth-Benders, you fool! If this were the Air Nomads Place, would you go around breaking wind?"

Bumi cackled once more. The court almost sighed in unison. Valtin looked down, tired and a bit broken.

"I sometimes wish I had never progressed past Inventory Master of the Capitol."

The escort now looked intrigued.

"You were an Inventory Master? King Bumi, I will be escort to this man while he remains here, anyway. I ask that I now do so while he tackles organizing our own stores and supplies, without an Inventory Master since your revered Uncle left us forty years ago."

Valtin winced.

"Forty years?"

"Well, personally I still think it's too soon, but Unc would have understood. Crazy Old Man-he was the family eccentric. Always so-organized."

Bumi looked at Shira.

"What about you, lady?"

"Chiefly-I plan banquets and events and affairs."

Bumi walked up close to her.

"Does your husband know about these affairs?"

One of her rescuers stepped forward again.

"Majesty-the ladies of the court support the bid of Lady Shira to be your event organizer."

Shira looked at her 'supporters', and then at Bumi's wild grin. She realized then just how deeply hatred of the Fire Nation ran.

"I accept-but I'll need day care for Tom-Tom."

Bumi raised a finger.

"Royal Day Care, at your service. I like the little so-and-so-plus I still have to figure out how in blazes he got up that high."

The next day, Valtin was escorted by the officer he knew, and by another, more belligerent.

"The others can get all chummy with you, Fire Nation scum! But I will be watching your every movement."

The two opened the main entrance to the underground storehouses. The disrepair and disorganization were brutally apparent. Valtin looked at his accuser.

"Now-you will be watching me cry."

After about ten minutes, the accusing officer had to fight back a 'there, there'. Valtin regained his composure after ten more minutes.

"I suggest we look for hidden chambers."

The friendlier officer, Captain Aedren, asked the obvious.

"Why hidden chambers?"

Valtin shook his head.

"Because, being hidden, they cannot possibly be the transcendent cosmic mess the obvious ones are!"

A thought neither of his escorts felt like disputing. But the somewhat less friendly one, Lieutenant Poli, had to raise a point.

"Hidden chambers are usually uncovered by means of special skills. Neither of us are Earth-Benders."

Valtin looked around.

"I have served the Fire Nation all my days, and have advanced both through the nobility and high office. However, I remain at my core a bureaucrat. I know where bureaucrats hide things, and most importantly, I know how they hide them."

While the two officers pushed every sigil, symbol and carving they could lay hands on, Valtin saw his objective.

"Note that corner that is not quite flush with the rest of the walls? Why would anyone skilled in bending, in service to their monarch, allow such a flaw? Why would those overseeing it allow them to go forward?"

Poli shrugged.

"Bumi might see it, and I guess his family line was the same way. But maybe they never got back this far."

Valtin nodded.

"You are correct. Even an Earth-bending Master King might miss or disregard that one tiny flaw in such synchronous perfection."

Valtin pushed at the lower rock with his foot, and the wall began to move.

"But a bureaucrat never would-unless he himself seeded such flaws."

The two officers almost expected Valtin to bolt, logistics aside, as the dazzling switches did their work. But he had admitted his true core to them, and one bureaucrat gave silent appreciation for the hard work of another. Aedren looked at the exposed wing of chambers.

"Jewels?"

Poli shook his head.

"A thief would see what our charge did, too-and disregard this as a probable hiding place. To someone looking for hidden things, it would be almost too obvious."

Valtin agreed.

"There's metal-thick metal, I believe, at the far opposite end of the main chamber. A hardened target, too much effort for most treasure thieves-"

Valtin bent down and picked up a small object.

"-unless you choose to redefine what treasure is..."

Before Bumi the next day, the trio showed its find.

"Tyrkinsa Seeds? Really?"

A gasp seemed to flow through the court. Aedren bowed and smiled.

"Their shells keep the meat inside them fresh and insect free, and I don't know how many centuries' worth of store we have in that one wing alone."

Poli had two bags, one he tossed to his king.

"The people can grind these up for paste, and our worries about famine are a thing of the past..."

He then pointed at Valtin.

"So long as no one informs our enemies of this storehouse."

Valtin sighed. As he had said, he knew his position well.

"You want an honest answer? Yes, I would betray you all to my countrymen, were they to arrive en masse to rescue me or retake the city. But Fire Lord Ozai has little or no use for failures. So they aren't coming. But surely a demand to turn me over must have come by now?"

Bumi rubbed his beard, then looked at Tom-Tom, seated on a mini-throne of his own.

"See, kid? They told us not to eat that messenger hawk! A bit on the chewy side, to boot."

Valtin was shaking, but an unlikely ally stepped forward.

"The man is our prisoner, but there's no need to play with him like that."

"Keep your pants on, Poli. Geez-your father was the same way-and your grandfather-and your great-grandfather-and his father, when we were kids. Wow-am I old or what?"

A general order was given that the trio keep digging in the storehouses, with a couple of Earth-benders and a scroll-keeper in tow as well. Bumi for his part had worries of his own.

The next day, as Shira pushed the carriage holding-and keeping-Tom-Tom-Bumi fumed.

"I'm the king! You can't force me to go shopping!"

"We are GOING to update the color scheme on the court's walls. It's positively ancient."

"It's dirt, woman! It's SUPPOSED to be ancient."

"Pick a color-my liege."

"Ehhh-Flaming Peach!"

"That's ugly."

"You're Fire Nation. I thought you liked flaming things."

His smile did nothing to disarm Shira's determination.

"If you want that color scheme, I suggest a blend of pink quartzite and red granite."

"They're difficult to blend and keep the blasted things stable!"

Shira folded her arms.

"Pity we don't have a legendary Master Earth Bender on hand to do such a thing."

Bumi thought he had an out. He looked at the ladies in the stone-smith's shop.

"Ladies Of Omashu-this foreigner, this Prisoner Of War, is trying her best to tell your King that a mix of pink quartz and red granite for the courtyard walls would be a better color scheme than my royal choice-Flaming Peach!"

"Peach? Really?"

"Ugly as sin."

"Quartz Granite."

"Flaming Peach? The thought alone has me breaking out in hives."

The murmurs and comments all went Shira's way. Bumi was furious.

"Oh, sure! The Four Nations have been at war for a hundred years, but women always agree with each other! Why am I even here?"

Shira smiled.

"Just wait till we get you to the clothier for your fittings!"

Again, nation aside, Bumi saw no sympathy in the eyes of his subjects. Still, the ladies were certain : The Fire Nation may have conquered most of the world, but Shira would never conquer Bumi's way of doing things.

A few weeks went by, and while Bumi remained Bumi, the new outer coating on the courtyard's walls impressed many, as did the regal orange curtains to replace the old green ones. Shira regretfully pointed out the error of many.

"No, they were always orange. The green-came from moss that grew over them, before they were finally cleaned."

Bumi roared when he heard this.

"Murderer! That moss had a family!"

The day came when no less than two messenger hawks were seen, and the prisoners of war became excited. Valtin stood before a crowd of almost-well-wishers, who at least granted that he had acted well in an awkward situation, as had his wife.

"When are we to be turned over? I'll bet you get a hundred of your countrymen for each of us!"

Bumi for once seemed very reluctant to speak.

"We-have been asked to turn the three of you over to the forces of the Fire Lord Ozai. heh. But it's not all good news."

Valtin looked at Shira, who nodded. Valtin then spoke their common assessment.

"For my failure here, I am to be demoted?"

That would hurt. Ozai might even diminish their rank within the nobility itself, were he of a mind to.

"Not-so much demoted-as-"

Again, the reticence of a man never known for it was eerie.

"-as-Executed."

Shira shook her head.

"But we-Valtin-never ordered a retreat! The soldiers did so without us, without even asking for a retreat-or certainly a withdrawal!"

Bumi picked up the scroll.

"This-doesn't even mention Omashu and the occupation. Ummm-you have an older daughter, one of the girls who was gonna exchange me for Tom-Tom here?"

Though under a death sentence, Valtin still kept back all the whys of that day, including the interference of the Crown Princess.

"Yes. Our daughter Mai travels in the personal entourage of Crown Princess Azula, along with their friend, Ty Lee. Surely she can intervene on our behalf?"

Bumi ate three pieces of rock candy, then cleared his throat.

"Ye-ah. Funniest thing, that. Seems like Mai and that giggly girl-kinda cute-they-kind of got sentenced to prison for uh-High Treason."

Shira pointed.

"Define High Treason!"

"They tried to assassinate Crown Princess Azula, while aiding the fugitive former Crown Prince Zuko."

Valtin would later apologize to his wife for words she would not remember being said anyway.

"Yes, that pretty much defines High Treason."

Again, Shira had not heard her husband's awkward words, and instead reached for what hope she had.

"What prison are they being kept in?"

Bumi looked the scroll over.

"The Boiling Rock?"

Shira breathed in.

"My brother is the warden there. He will see to it that..."

Bumi closed his eyes.

"Your brother is no longer warden. Your house's rank, wealth and lands are all forfeit to the crown. Folks, I'm really sorry. For what it's worth, you are not being turned over for that."

Shira began to tear up.

"We-have nothing? Not even a guarantee that my daughter and brother are even still alive?"

Her eyes dried and then flashed with rage.

"All because my daughter FINALLY tried to do what Ursa should have done when that monster was in the cradle?"

Valtin looked at her in horror, but she dismissed this entirely.

"What? Are we afraid of him even here? Can we be sentenced to painful death twice? We have given over the course of our lives for that family, and most of them are monsters in Human form."

Valtin looked out at the crowd that was now all sympathetic. This did not help his mood.

"Please-all of you can tell the Fire Lord. Didn't I conquer your city, and force you to build his statue? I'm a vicious Fire Nation thug-tell him I debauched your daughters! Tell him I debauched your livestock and laughed! Tell him how I crowed that anyone who was disloyal to the Fire Nation would be imprisoned! I am your conqueror-ahhh! All of you execute me for war crimes! That will permit my wife and son to go home and receive back all-"

He sank to his knees.

"-all that we have lost."

Shira stood and shook.

"Please, King Bumi-send back this message to the great Fire Lord Ozai-"

Her shaking stopped.

"Tell him I'm sorry our daughter doesn't have better aim!"

The grieving couple was led out to their chambers, and while they themselves had risen in the esteem of their former conquered subjects, the Fire Nation was never more hated. Captain Aedren questioned his King.

"Sire-what was in the scroll from the second hawk?"

Bumi palmed what looked like a small piece from a Pai Sho game.

"Circular letter. Offer for a free boat if I listen to some huckster all day selling time-share in the Great Swamp."

Bumi shook his head.

"I really hate getting these things."

His smile belied any such hatred.

That night, Shira rose to ask her guards for some bread. She hadn't eaten since hearing the news - the news that ended her world. But there were no guards.

"Of course not. Where would we go?"

She realized what she had blurted out, but found it hard to regret. Even before Ursa had vanished, Azula had been a pain. Besides, it really didn't matter anymore.

"Shira? Over here."

It was Telen, one of the ladies of the court, guiding her to a meeting with the other ladies. Deciding that another dressing-down could no harm, Shira offered no objection to what she thought was to come. But to her shock, a small pastry was brought out and served among all of them.

"The Fire Nation may not know how to treat its own. But we do."

Shira felt a part of nothing that night.

"And am I now one of your own?"

Telen related a quick story.

"Once, the Earth Kingdom was not the several cities. But one of the most powerful and wealthy clans-whose name is not mentioned by treaty agreement-was also one of the most anal and uptight, insisting on protocol and the appearance of propriety above all else. Several noble families who did not meet their criteria of 'flawlessness' were set to be banished forever. The 24th Earth King relented, and sent his third son to be a lesser King in a new city, taking all of those meant to be purged with him. So you see, Omashu is at its core the home of those who were told to leave and not come back."

While far from everything to do with the occupation was forgiven that night, the long steps there began in earnest amidst swapped stories of insane royals and putting up with them.

But one week later, the king of all insane royals asserted himself once more. Valtin found that he was not to take out his organizing party that morning.

"Bumi has vanished?"

Poli nodded.

"He can be like this, but I fear this time, he may have disappeared just when we face an attack. Valtin-you must administer the city."

"What? The people will never accept me. I don't care how much forgiveness we may have gotten."

Aedren pointed to a table full of scrolls.

"We are the leaders of the royal guards. No one need know that it all isn't in the King's name. But decisions need prioritization. There is no way we can sort through that mess."

At the sight of another mess left him, Valtin sighed but pulled himself together.

"First decision has to be for the defense of the city. I will-recommend- that scouts try to gain knowledge of Fire Nation troop and vessel movement-oh my!"

Valtin began to sweat.

"Calendar?"

The two showed him a calendar on Bumi's less-than-tidy work-table. Valtin sat down.

"How could I forget? Next week is the day of Sozin's Comet!"

Poli shook his head.

"You people lose your powers for eight minutes during Black Sun, but you get to have them amped up for a whole day. Maybe fate does favor your-their-victory."

The scouts were sent out, and the trio looked not for treasure but for order. Shira, having no banquets to plan, once more took over care of her son.

Five days later, and the scouts' report spoke of a fleet such as had never been seen before. Aedren was at a loss.

"They own Ba Sing Se. We don't have a force one-third that size on our best days. What could be their goal?"

Poli was in no better shape.

"A hardened target? But with that much firepower-literally-behind them, what's left that could be that hard?"

Valtin thought back to two arguing brothers.

"General Iroh once told Ozai that there were two things at Ba Sing Se he could not penetrate. One was the walls. The other-was the hearts of the peoples of the Earth Kingdom. He firmly believed one day he would return there and deal with the walls. But the pride of your people? He knew that could not be crushed, so long as you lived."

Valtin made a chilling statement.

"The same was once said of the Air Nomads."

A war council was called. Concern was too high to question Valtin's credibility.

"The sewers again?"

"Not with the power they'll be setting against us. Plus, the veterans of the occupation will know where to look."

Valtin saw a thousand proposals come and go, and was unsure of what to do. The solution was obvious to him, but he was the outsider, the conqueror so wretched his own people disowned him. What right had he to speak?

"We need a solution! They will burn us all alive!"

Valtin had quoted Iroh before. He now gained his insight as well. The place he had failed to conquer was the place he now must save. The man history would call Valtin of Omashu rose to lead his people in their darkest hour.

"The storehouses for the tyrkinsa nuts are not only deep, but underground rivers flow around all sides of it. Food and water, and a safe hole to crawl into. A tight fit perhaps. But livable. Who will support me?"

The evacuation began ten minutes later.

Valtin and Shira heard their share of remarks as families, supplies, and some few treasured possessions made their way into the storehouses.

"Are your people crazy enough to burn down the whole world?"

"I hope not-but we better get inside nevertheless. I've learned not to make book on Ozai's rationality."

"What if your people's soldiers come to take the city?"

"Why-they'll kill us first of all-our daughter is a traitor."

"Our king is insane to leave us at a time like this!"

"Want to trade? We'll raise you one Lord and a Princess on that front."

The storehouses, while vast, still held in them the population of an entire city. The earth-benders closed the great doors, with their metal outer coating. If some thought about doubting Valtin's assessment of the grim situation, the pounding and heat from the outside shoved all that aside.

"If they're attacking, why don't they try and open these doors? Anything beats this waiting."

The people of Omashu had been on the run, and they had heard about the refugee problem in Ba Sing Se. Now, they were on-the-run refugees in their own city, and their fallen conqueror had been the one to lead them to safety when their mercurial king had booked. The ancient phrase _'The Earth Shifts Just That Way'_ was used a lot during the day-long siege.

The men of the court revealed a grim secret to their ladies. Shira, recalling an old song, led the older children in raising their voices.

"Now, a number of expectant mothers have chosen this day to bless us all. So let us welcome the newest memories of their community."

*_Happy Birthday, To You, Happy Birthday To You, Happy Birthday Dear Children, Happy Birthday To You*_

The men all stared at the front door.

"I suppose coating it with metal was a mistake."

Valtin looked down.

"I have killed us."

Poli shook his head.

"We're alive. If what went on out there was enough to melt that metal and seal us in-no way we would have lived through it."

Two more days passed. Tempers were fraying, wills were being sapped, and the stench was something no one hoped to live through again.

The outer doors began to crack. Poli shouted.

"Earth-benders! It has to be!"

Aedren was less certain of the benign nature of the entrance.

"Yeah-well, didn't the Dai Li in Ba Sing Se defect to the Fire Nation?"

Through the stone, and shockingly, the metal, a small figure began to walk through.

"Hi, Folks-my name's Toph. I'm with the Avatar's bunch."

She could hear their ragged breathing, and could sense that the silence was a stunned one.

"Ummm-did I mention that the Avatar kicked Fire Lord Ozai's fat butt, and that THE WAR IS OVER!"

Gasps were soon followed by cheers, and then said cheers stopped when their king approached. Bumi saw the glares, and gulped.

"Oh-hey-did I forget to mention I was going to Ba Sing Se to help liberate it? Yeah-I guess I did. My Bad."

Valtin and Shira held Tom-Tom as they let the others pass by first. Their feelings were a bit mixed. The nation they once held dear had proven corrupt, and while it had been brought down, this seemed little cause for celebration. Telen ran to get them, carafes of tea firmly in hand.

"Come on, you two-the Avatar's group brought in a tea vendor, and it's all you can drink."

The two followed slowly, thirst and the need for some good tea overriding nerves and depression. But another shock awaited. Telen pointed at the 'tea vendors'.

"I don't know who they are, but this has to be the best tea I have ever had."

It was an older man with a beard, aided by a young man with an apparent scar on his face. Shira felt faint.

"I know who they are. That is General Iroh, and that-that is my daughter's boyfriend, likely also the new Fire Lord."

Telen looked as shocked as any of them.

"I'll say this much-when you Fire Nation folk seek forgiveness, you don't fool around, do you?"

_**THE PRESENT**_

Toph finished up.

"So anyway, King Bumi asked me to show him metal-bending after he saw what I did to the storehouse doors-but I don't want to go into that."

Toph almost seemed angry as she cut herself off. Mai was still stunned.

"My parents saved the city?"

"More like they saved everyone. Turns out the city was only hit with about ten stray fireballs and bolts as the fleet advanced-never a direct hit. But any one of them could have killed the entire population. When it was over, your Dad even suggested harvesting Ozai's fallen statue for the marble needed to reface the areas burnt and melted. They're not any better with Bumi than I am, right now. Your folks are their real heroes."

Mai also had buttons she didn't wish to be pushed, so changing the subject was a given.

"You sound sour on Bumi, but you sure left to come here in a big hurry. Sokka said you got a scroll from your family. Sorry for that."

"Did he mention the second scroll?"

"No."

Toph smiled.

"Why does that jerk always have to be so nice? Well, this one was from my Nanny Evlei. Growing up, she always knew I wasn't helpless, and, when my parents weren't looking, helped me to learn not to be either. She said in her scroll that she knew the news would hurt me, but that I deserved to know."

Never much of a talker or a listener, Mai still kept on with a girl, who, battle-sides notwithstanding, she had more in common with than the family she had come to visit.

"Which was what?"

Toph tried to keep up her non-committal air.

"Oh-well-my Mom has made several requests for Volla Root Extract-as pure as she can get. I mean, this was inevitable, right?"

Mai sighed. She knew the root well. Women past the most optimal ages for childbearing often used this root to aid an easy conception-though usually these were women with sons and daughters out in battle or lost to it.

"Hey, sorry. That's rough."

"Rough?"

Her eyes aside, Toph's gaze fixed on Mai's face.

"Do you have any idea what it's like to be notified that your parents are basically starting over from scratch, and that you're the thing they want to scratch off?"

Mai saw her parents in the distance, blissfully pushing little Tom-Tom, looking nothing like the uptight ladder-climbers who had no time for her.

"Yeah-I kind of do. Hey, Toph?"

"Yeah?"

"Let's you and me find a greasy bowl somewhere. A stand that serves food you'll love now and regret later."

Toph jumped off her seat.

"Funny. Zuko told me you like really fancy done up food."

"I do-when it's with him. Plus, when we were on the road, Azula would seek out the fancy places in town. Ty Lee and I would find some relief by finding a good cheap place she'd never set foot in."

Toph laughed.

"I know. We all once ate at the same place-Rana's CheeseNBeef. Ty Lee can pack it in for someone her size."

Mai nodded.

"And-she never gains an ounce. I'll pay in exchange for your story about King Bumi."

"You that anxious to be miserable?"

"You forget who you're talking to."

"Touche."

The pair were away before anyone they knew saw them.

_**NEXT : Toph's tale, Mai's confrontation, and Bumi's boo-boos**_


	2. Chapter 2

Mettle And Steal 2

Mai grew visibly more annoyed as her joyful-looking parents approached. She turned to Toph.

"Get us out of here, please?"

Raising a column of earth, Toph rode them away to the one place Valtin wouldn't be on his day off-the very vaults that had recently transformed his life.

"Yeah, I didn't feel like baby-sitting today anyway."

Mai hoped that Omashu would once again start boring her. She felt that she could do without any more surprises.

"You've been baby-sitting Tom-Tom?"

Toph shrugged.

"I like babies. They laugh at your jokes, even when they're not funny-or even if they're Sokka's."

"Sokka's jokes aren't that bad. We two have been getting along pretty well, lately, keeping Zuko from overworking himself."

Toph smiled.

"I kind of figged on you two. If Aang said to venture down a giant serpent's throat, Katara would gather clothes for it while Sokka would stutter 'a giant serpent's throat!'. You wouldn't stutter-you'd go even more monotone. But it's the same difference, really."

"I guess."

"Anyway, why wouldn't I like Tom-Tom? He's not the one leading the charge to replace me."

Mai practically felt Toph's bitterness as a sympathetic vibration.

"You don't hate that baby. You hate your parents."

Toph turned and looked so furious, the blood vessels in her eyes were nearly visible.

"Do NOT! Do not tell me who I do and don't hate."

The anger faded, and Mai was glad the concern on her face would be lost on Toph.

"Sorry-its just-I gave them over a decade of what they wanted. I hid my existence. What do you want to bet they publicly call this new baby their firstborn child?"

The two found a place in the shade, and decided to do their continued moping there instead.

"Mai?"

"Yeah?"

"How come we can each sit down with people we were trying to kill just a year back, but talking to our own families makes us into bent mud?"

Mai shook her head.

"That's easy. With an enemy, you can be on your guard. With a former enemy, you can forgive and forget. But against family, we are always vulnerable. They have weapons no enemy will ever possess, and a willingness to use them that might make Azula wince. Note-I said 'might'. I am talking about Azula."

"I can dig it. Which brings me to a question. Now, I wasn't with the others when Azula recruited you here, but I caught most of it while one of the Joo-Dees kept us waiting in Ba Sing Se. So I have to ask you-if you don't resent Tom-Tom, then why didn't you object when Azula called off the trade for him and Bumi?"

Ty Lee had asked the same thing-a month later, when they had their first free hours from under Azula's direct gaze.

"Well, you don't really object to Azula-she just drives around objections, and over those that make them. Plus-I was afraid that if she knew how much worth I assigned to my little brother's life-"

"Sorry-I understand now."

It was Mai's turn to sound a little bitter.

"No, you don't understand. Azula didn't kidnap me. I went willingly, because what she proposed sounded like fun, and often enough, it was fun. For a long while, I wanted nothing more than to catch you and all your friends, and hope that I could somehow give Zuko the Avatar so that he and I could be home and together."

Toph pointed at her ears.

"These work fine, you know. Better than they do for most, as a matter of fact. Your 'sound signature' was never of someone under duress. We were on different sides, and you believed in your nation's war. Big surprise there."

"Maybe it's not a shocker. But it leads back again. See, even though Ty Lee and I were, for the most part, joining her for fun and patriotic fervor-she still talked to us most times like we were recruited at knife-point. She would bring up Tom-Tom, and what a nice looking family I had-well, let's just say I started remembering that while Azula was someone I knew growing up, calling her a friend had always been a bit of a stretch."

Toph was again picking up on some revisionism.

"How much of a stretch?"

"The kind of stretch that even Zuko couldn't beg for in our most lovey-dovey moments, and both of us hopped up on some of Uncle's private tea stock."

Toph was going to comment on there being too much information, but then again, she had asked for it.

"That is a stretch. So basically, you liked doing what she asked you to do, and it wouldn't have mattered if you didn't like it, and even in that, she still managed to pinch your nerve endings."

Mai would likely never be closer to anyone than Ty Lee. But Toph, like Sokka, was proving very easy to talk to.

"There is one more factor - my folks. You say yours didn't want you to exist? Well, I can at least compete in that arena. Mine didn't want me to exist unless I behaved in exactly the manner they wanted. I got whatever I wanted gift-wise, so long as I staid within the lines they drew. Stray outside, and everything-"

The girl called emotionless was at least calling that charge into question as she kept on.

"-everything seemed to become my fault."

Toph made no pretense of understanding this.

"How far were you straying?"

"Nowhere near as far as I would later on. In fact, not really at all. In one instance, I forgot to greet an older Duke with our eyes half-met rather than averted. Another time, I waited too long to begin eating my meal at a major reception. I deliberately waited until all the host's children had begun to eat, which was regarded as an insult to the hostess's choice of cooking staff."

Toph showed her disdain for that sort of thing, a contempt born of familiarity.

"Well! I would have had you BEHEADED on the spot for those crimes!"

"I know. But at the time, it was all deadly serious. I kept hearing how this or that mistake cost my father a shot at this or that opening in the RLF's service. So I shut myself down and did only what I was told. I was no longer being raked over the coals, but I was burning up inside. My father got his promotions, though."

Toph felt like she was hearing her own alternate story a nation or so removed, but was still confused.

"Why all this focus on getting promoted? You were Fire Nation nobility."

Mai lay down in the opposite direction from Toph, who didn't notice the sun.

"The Fire Nation is loaded down with nobility. The war kept creating victories, and repeated victors can only be promoted so far. Sozin and then Azulon made a practice out of enobling their most successful officers with titles. Add a century to all that, and suddenly it's harder to find commoners anymore. Likely, that was part of the problem driving the war. Nobles want lands of their own."

"So your family was new to the world of special utensils for every bite of food and cheeses that all taste like nut paste?"

"That wasn't the problem. We'd been inside for a while. My ancestor saved Sozin from a surprisingly tough old Air Nomad on the day of the Comet. I-"

Mai felt the old family story turn to ashes in her throat.

"-I think that might have been Aang's mentor, Gyaotsu."

Even if the Avatar was a bit too bright and cheery for her tastes, Mai knew what he meant to Zuko. The horror of creating a rift between them made her ill.

"Hey-breathe."

"Huh?"

"Are you honestly worried Aang would blame you for an ancestor? The kid wouldn't even kill your future father-in-law."

It was an annoyingly valid point, so Mai quickly got back on track.

"Well, we weren't the newest, but we were far from the oldest. One time, we lost out being seated at a table that your family once occupied before the war, and my Mom was furious for weeks."

"So was mine, when she received the notice of auction. The war for the fate of the world was SUCH a baw-ther!"

Mai actually cracked a smile. Historically, no one really liked the Bei Fongs, but with their money, no one had to.

"Still, it was always one of them going on about another father and husband who'd gotten the prime nod over farmland near the Air Temples, or the Earth Border Colonies - or some mother and wife who'd put on a reception that dazzled Azulon, and then Ozai. I learned to throw like I can to build instant stairways on the side of walls, to get away from my parents. I learned to move like I do erasing the evidence of my passing as I went into hiding for the day."

Toph sighed.

"You want I should out-depress you?"

"You kidding? Whine away, sister. My misery loves company with a passion."

Toph started her story.

"After Sokka read me those lovely scrolls from my folks, I wanted out of anywhere they knew I hung. They have no influence over Omahsu and no desire to even acknowledge the place exists."

Mai had already picked up the backhanded role Toph's family had played in founding ancient Omashu, that exile of lesser nobility being the city's practical origin, as opposed to the city's legendary origin with the two lovers. As Iroh had explained, all Earth Kingdom cities had separate but co-existing origin stories. One was the stuff of legend, where the earth meets the sky. One was the more real world story, where the earth met fire and water.

"So you were firmly out of their loopy loop."

"Yeah. But the Earth Kingdom is always full of dirt."

_**OMASHU, OVER A MONTH PRIOR**_

The column of Earth that came at her was an amazingly mixed bag. It was not all anything, being unequal parts soft dirt, harsh sand, pebbles, boulders, stones and mud. Her only choice was to make a gamble on exactly when the wave _might_ end, and push back two instances ahead of that.

The old man was good, but the girl was one who viewed this as nothing but a challenge to be met with mouth wide and teeth bared.

Her own pushback came in the form of a veritable hurricane of boulders, surely more boulders than she actually had on hand or could manipulate successfully-yet the King was still being pummeled by the assault just as though neither limit existed. Her trick was a good one, and though in his core, he knew it was just a trick, she was not allowing him so much as a half-second to figure it out.

The girl was good, but the old man only needed a quarter-second to stop one of the boulders she was recycling on the sly. The King Of Omashu renewed his attack.

The stone behemoth seemed to grow with every second. Toph did not need eyes to feel the air its growth dispersed, the gravity well it developed going from notable to flesh-tingling between heartbeats. Bumi was creating this outer body so methodically and carefully, Toph couldn't hear it properly. Getting her bearings would be difficult, but this was a young woman who'd kept a double life and faced down the best and worst of her peers, and there were few of those.

The old man was better than she had thought, his status as a master aside. Beating him would take a better trick than his. Needless to say, she knew what this better trick was. In fact, she was in the process of making him give the materials for this trick to her.

The small target was still dodging his construct with speed, verve, skill, and, he was forced to admit, creativity. After all, she was the one who actually broke through the loving denseness that was Aang and showed him the Earthbender's way. Politics and war aside, it was not a task he had relished. Bumi still wanted to use the raw power his giant of stone and earth gave him, but it was becoming rapidly apparent that he would have to fight smarter, not harder. He began to slow his hammer-like blows, lessening their impact only a little but dramatically increasing their maneuverability. Toph was tossed around several times, more than once striking the earth without the benefit of softening it first. Yet the girl who had faced down a psychotic princess, two warriors now mostly friends, and an entire fleet of over-powered Firebenders was again not put down so easily.

The girl was better than he thought, her recently-developed legend aside. Short of the non-bending Sokka, she was the one who least allowed the seriousness of their world-saving quest to throw her off. Like Sokka, she also knew the sting of not being taken seriously, and so fought to be ever more innovative as a hedge against this attitude. But Bumi, who had been dismissed more than once in his century-plus life for a variety of reasons, was still only halfway into his bag of tricks. Plus, there was some blood to be settled : It was a Bei Fong noble who had suggested the Earth King send his 'idiot' third son to reign over Omashu. Bumi had long ago concluded that his ancestor had in fact been a bit dim, and certainly blaming Toph for that was unfair. But Bumi had no problem with unfairness, so long as it wasn't vicious as well.

She was tired, and a bit bruised. She re-hydrated herself by separating dirt from mud to craft needed water, something a catfight with Katara had taught her. A couple of edible bugs here and there had gone a long way to keeping up her strength. Yet she knew her endgame had to be soon, so Toph made her move. Tiny bits of metal and easily-manipulated elements had been gathered by her since the moment they started, and had been amped up as Bumi made his stone giant. Now, she gathered together her own giant, half the size of Bumi's but made of metal. In fact, the two giants now stood against each other at sizes relative to the real combatants' height difference.

The old man was the best.

The girl was the best.

Giant stone fist met giant metal fist, and the vibrations seemed fit to do what the Fire Nation never even tried, and bring down the walls of Omashu. Instead, it was the behemoths who shattered, leaving both combatants dazed and confused. The sharp-eyed old man couldn't see a thing, and the sharp-eared girl couldn't process the sound of her own breathing.

Bumi seized on the larger pieces of his construct, making them into a shield that surrounded him from further attack.

Toph took the metal and made herself a tent, thickness enough to turn even a Comet-enhanced Firebender away.

The people watching waited outside the arena, and made bets as to strategies to come. They had seen a grand show, and had no doubt of either combatant's tenacity.

After a half an hour passed, each one was checked in their defensive positions. Both had fallen asleep.

They were revived and asked whether or not they wished to surrender.

Their wild laughter at this notion shook both sides of the arena. Vast new columns of Earth arose behind each of them.

Then they collapsed, and the decision to suspend battle taken out of their hands for that day.

_**TWO DAYS LATER**_

As giddy as a man one century his junior, Bumi approached Toph to begin the lessons that were the real reason she had come to his city.

"Show me."

She took his hands and placed it on the metal. His fingers stiffened immediately.

"All right, we've got to lose that immediately. This is nothing to be afraid of."

"Who-who-who said I was afraid?"

"Nothing to be ashamed of. Metal has been the in-born enemy of our Bent since people started telling stories. In all those stories? The pluckiest Earthbenders you can find, once trapped in a metal cage, are done until they're rescued-if they are rescued. I was afraid of it too - until my parents ticked me off so hard, my rage gave me the focus to see past the fear."

Bumi picked up on her choice of words.

"To - Heh - 'See' past it?"

Toph blew her bangs off her forehead for the tenth time that morning.

"I'm allowed-you're not."

This time, he pressed his hands to the metal sheet.

"How am I supposed to sense impurities that may not even be there?"

Toph almost casually poked a hole in Bumi's sheet with one finger.

"Sokka said the Mechanist told him that, until they develop a smelting process that rivals an exploding volcano's core in temperature, no metal will ever be so pure as to be resistant to what I can do to it. Even then, the finalizing involved might actually make it more impure on some levels. Because of me, there is now no real way to imprison an Earthbender."

"Ex-cept putting them in a room made of stone backed up by wood, surrounded by water, which would drown them if they tried to get out."

Toph knew a distraction argument when she heard one.

"Except for that. Point being, it's not simple anymore. Now, have you picked up on the impurities in your sheet yet?"

Bumi's look of disdain meant nothing to Toph, and in fact, it likely would have meant little, even if she could see it.

"One grain of sand gets mixed in, and I'm supposed to use it how?"

"It's more than one grain, and even if it were, it can be like a serrated blade inside a hollow tree if used correctly. Are you even sensing them?"

Vision issues aside, the man with the wide eyes looked straight into the blank eyes of the young girl, the veins in his face and head putting on quite a show for those that cared.

"Girlie-girl, I was an Earthbending Supreme Master when your grandfather was choking on his first silver spoon!"

Toph had a style of teaching, which she hated adjusting. She had done so for Aang, because she liked Aang, and because Aang was trying. Bumi to her mind was not even trying, and she was decidedly unsure about the other part.

"And yet-and yet-you've never been able to metal-bend. You couldn't do it then, and you can't do it now. Your mind refuses to manipulate an impurity your senses tell you is there. I know I won't have this trouble with Aang. You were his playmate, the wild and crazy one? Maybe all that wackiness hides a mind that is blinder than my eyes could ever be!"

Bumi's fist actually lashed out at these words, but stopped short as Toph raised a small barrier of stone-fronted by metal shaped by her will.

"What are you doing? This is not a charade! I actually have to teach a man who liberated a city by his lonesome how to use an advantage he knows is in there? You are a Supreme Master, and when this is done, I'll be proud and pleased to learn from you, one of the most powerful our Bent has ever produced, including all the Avatars. But I'm not getting anything from this. Are you Bumi The Old Trickster, or does that only work when you're mock-terrifying three kids as a prank?"

Bumi began to stalk off.

"I'm through!"

Toph slipped metal underneath him, placed it all around him, and sucked away all rocks and sand and such from the prison she now placed the King Of Omashu in.

"There's no Earth in here!"

"Yes there is. It's just not visible."

After a minute of his pounding, Toph almost gave in and released him, but instead decided to push her luck one last time.

"Heh. Maybe the ancient Bei Fongs were right about the trash we dumped on this backwater."

As the holes opened up all over her prison like bubbles on a grill-cake, Toph felt heat emerging from its position.

"Could it be I carried this thing just a little too far?"

Bumi's form was extremely muscular now, but he used none of that to hurl jagged pieces of his former cage at the girl who formed the first wave of them into a shield, then played one more game.

"How-HOW DID YOU ESCAPE MY TRAP?"

Bumi shook with fury.

"Are you crazy? How do you think I escaped? I met-I metal-I metal-ben-"

His form relaxed. His fury dissipated.

"I did it! I DID IT!"

He got a smarmy look on his face.

"And you said I couldn't."

Toph fell back, and into a stone chair she crafted.

"Oh, I knew you could. I was beginning to doubt that I could-teach you that is."

Bumi's servants brought them both some cold drinks, and Toph smiled.

"Just remember, don't you go any easier on me when it's my turn as student."

"Heh-yeah-Your turn as student. About that-"

But Toph was already asleep, and snoring fit to bust. Bumi gulped.

"I am in soooo much trouble..."

THE NEXT DAY

Toph was a bit confused as she was raised up.

"Umm-a metal casing like the one you were kept in? I can bust right through this."

Bumi shook his head.

"That's a huge nope and nope again. Ya gotta make this one without bending the metal itself - just like I did."

Toph scrunched her forehead.

"Hello? I'm not in contact with the Earth. You even washed my feet!"

"Hey! That was by demand of my servants. They can only take so much, and honey, your tootsies could make Koh The Face Stealer cry!"

For all of an hour, Toph struggled to reason out the puzzle she'd been presented with.

"Ok, teacher-teach."

Bumi fought off prideful laughter, but only just.

"Can't do it, can you? Just-just call to the Earth below you and pelt the casing with rocks."

"Okay-what part of 'Not in contact with the Earth' are you not hearing?"

Bumi now seemed less confident.

"Well, there are other ways of being in contact with the Earth than just touching it, you know."

Toph was beginning to sweat, and she wasn't overly fond of this.

"Such as?"

"The earth is always there-in one form or another. You just have to make-ehhhhhh..."

His attempt at deception was going over worse than her sweat.

"What do I have to make, YOUR MAJESTY?"

Not a praying sort, Toph still offered a quick one up that Bumi wouldn't say exactly what he did say next.

"Well, when they had me disoriented up there, and my feel for the Earth was gone, I still managed to make-"

"Yes?"

"Eye-contact."

Toph's explosion was yet to come. To her credit, she tried to stay calm.

"Well-that might not work so well with me, ya know? So, what's your back-up plan?"

"Yeah-back-up plan. Plan to show you how to make contact with the Earth absent touch and-absent sight..."

The king of Omashu suddenly became very pouty.

"No one knew you'd come here this soon! I still hadn't figured out that angle when you just up and showed your face."

Toph burst out of her confinement and rode the metal down to Bumi.

"Sooooo...you had me teach you the greatest single breakthrough technique in Earthbending history, while all that same time you had no way even in mind to teach me YOUR big secret?"

Bumi almost backed off from his position.

"You make it sound so dirty."

Toph's face turned volcano red.

"You piece of-"

It was at this time that the weapon Toph's friend Sokka was testing in the Fire Nation went off, lighting the sky and filling the world itself with sound. It was as though the spirit world itself wanted to blank out what Toph said.

For that, we should really thank them.

_**THE PRESENT**_

Mai was disgusted.

"So a prince of the blood scammed you? That's almost as low as what Ozai pulled on Iroh."

Toph nodded.

"Thanks, Mai."

"I mean it, Toph. How can you even stand to be in this city with him?"

"Maybe I'm on a slow boil, plotting my ultimate revenge?"

Mai's silence showed her lack of humor on this matter (if not many others). Toph shook her head.

"Or maybe the old man still has some moves, and I want to salvage this trip before telling Aang what a loser his old friend has become. He won't be happy-presuming he believes me at first. Most of all-I just want to give the old man a chance to explain why he so needed to bamboozle me, rather than playing straight. He does that, and we're good."

Mai got up when Toph drifted off to sleep. This place was confusing her badly, and she wanted some answers. She was not ready yet to face her parents, so she recalled a name from Toph's narrative and sought her out.

"I'm here to see the Lady Telen."

Mai was guided in by servants who might have seen her battling at Azula's side, or walking confidently with her parents as enemy soldiers took possession of their city from them. Her time in The Boiling Rock under a warden now indifferent to her fate had exposed her to people who did not see the Fire Nation's 'Radiant Glow' as a good thing. It was more than just politics, or which side was winning, or even the atrocities that occurred in every war. Some of the crimes the prisoners accused the Fire Nation of were so matter-of-fact, simple and downright petty that only lack of embellishment seemed to confirm their story.

"This way, Lady Mai."

The Fire Nation's soldiers and officers rode in as was expected of conquerors, and sometimes, that meant brutality. But the tales many prisoners told were not about the fog of war, or a town guard too fond of the whip. These were tales of apple-stealing on top of the 'harvesting' that each town underwent. Even among the worst of the Fire Nation's commanders, soldiers found guilty of rape were severely punished, some even imprisoned in the towns of the people they had wronged. Yet no punishment waited for the ones who forced the attention of locals who caught their eye. Mai found she had less trouble accepting that war was a brutal thing than the thought that it was just this utterly sleazy thing. If Zuko's epiphany had been delivered by seeing the armies his great-grandfather first sent forth as brutal enforcers of a civilization most didn't want and never asked for, Mai's epiphany came in seeing those armies as little more than a gigantic extortion gang. For all her dislike of Azula, Mai had been loyal to her nation, until she saw how many families this economic cross-drilling had driven into poverty-the kind of poverty that saw many later in prison.

Lady Telen was waiting for Mai, sat down on cushions with poured tea at the ready.

"So you are Shira and Valtin's oldest. Welcome, my dear."

Mai made the immediate gestures owed to a gracious host, but got quickly to her point.

"Lady, just why is it I'm so welcome? I'm Fire Nation. I'm the child of the leaders of the mission that reduced your proud city to a province. I was part of a feared trio led by Princess Azula, renowned for her cruelty and effectiveness, the conqueror of your kingdom."

Telen seemed exactly what she was, a veteran lady of a court who knew how to maneuver outbursts.

"Well, currently, you are the envoy of both the Avatar and a new Fire Lord who has promised and delivered an astonishing amount of positive change. To hear it told, I am also addressing his future Queen. You are renowned as the betrayer of Azula, and likely the one who started her descent into what is widely said to be purest madness."

"I...like to think she was headed there anyway. Deep deep Mommy issues. Deeper than mine, and that throws me hard."

Telen again showed her easy mastery of this realm.

"We all have Mommy issues of some sort, dear. Mine never let me attend so much as High Tea without changing at least seven times-yes, usually ending up in the first thing I picked. The joy of payback awaits us only on the children we nitpick overmuch."

But Mai had walked in a political and social ring of fire, so her skills in verbal combat were not to be dismissed either.

"What about my Mom-and Dad? How is it you've all forgiven them so easily?"

Mai was expecting diplomacy or evasion. Instead, she got confrontation.

"Well, I don't really know that I have. That any of us have. That sort of forgiveness would be an extraordinary act, wouldn't it?"

The steel in her long sleeves was moving towards her fingers almost out of instinct. Mai realized she had taken in all the guards and potential strike zones both for and against her as she had been greeted. Old habits die hard.

"My dear, I'm long past my fighting days, and none of my staff-they're more like family-are up to stopping you. I don't do ambushes per se. Now, will you hear the rest of my answer?"

That she had seen 'fighting days' didn't surprise Mai entirely, and not anywhere near as much as how close her own still were, and how she wished they would be farther away instead.

"Yes, My Lady. My apologies."

"Actually, I was flattered that you could think me enough of a threat, even with those poorly-chosen words of mine as a catalyst. Now, I have come to like your parents. We come from the same basic stock - ennobled upper middle class sniffed at by those who have been landed since there have been Four Nations. We none of us cared for the way your Fire Lord chose to treat them. Whatever your crimes, they had been loyal and productive to him. It was an utterly déclassé moment for anyone, let alone the pretended ruler of the world. No offense."

Mai shook her head.

"The man I love is missing part of his face because of Ozai, Lady Telen. And despite what you hear, the contempt that led to that had little to do with questions raised improperly or unwanted traits of mercy or Zuko's warrior skills lacking and lots to do with birth order and family disputes."

Telen laughed lightly.

"Then Ozai really was unfit. A true noble knows never to air their wares publicly. As I was saying, there they were before us, just after Bumi liberated the city. I was among those who looked up and saw your baby brother high on the rafters, and I had only one thought : Let him fall. Let him fall, and let me watch the looks on your parents' faces as it happened. Let them know the pain their nation has inflicted on so many innocent families."

Mai looked at this woman not with rage, but surprise and shock.

"That, my dear, is why we are attempting to forgive your parents, and through them, your nation. Because I am a reasonably mature, well-trained lady of the court. If that kind of horrid, maniacal thought can consume my soul, then I fairly believe that such vengeance can one day re-ignite the war. We don't need it. It's like a tumor. Your parents have become 'our' Fire Nation. Our-project, if you will."

Mai was quick on the uptake, as always.

"So my parents have a place here - because you have a need for them?"

Telen nodded.

"It also fulfills an ancient circle. You see, while Sozin may have been arrogant and elitist, he was right about some things. The world he saw was an enormously fractious one. One of the older disputes between Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom involved our side's tendency to kidnap the Fire Nation's best bureaucrats. So by keeping your parents here in a form of permanent community service rather than the waste of imprisonment or execution, one can say Omashu got the last word in that old argument."

Telen asked a question.

"My dear, does Fire Lord Zuko intend to keep the borders of the Four Nations open for the foreseeable future, as regards trade?"

It was an odd thing to ask, but in fact Mai did know the answer.

"Until he can talk to King Kuei about resuming the throne of the Earth Kingdom. Chief Hakoda of the Southern Water Tribe has gotten Chief Arnook to agree to allow Fire Nation trade ships to approach if they submit to searches, but those have almost become routine. Probably by the time Kuei takes back the Enduring Throne, though, it will be normal policy. My friend Commander Sokka says that Hakoda, his Dad, is trying to start up a merchant marine fleet open to all the nations. Whatever goes on politically, trade-wise, this may already be one world."

Telen actually smiled at that. Where her bread was buttered was obvious.

"And what are the odds that Our Beloved Earth King will actually place his backside on The Enduring Throne once more?"

Mai heard the contempt in her voice; it was Mai's own as well.

"Avatar Aang is actually spending a good portion of his time hunting for clues to where Kuei is. But I think a flying bison sighting is giving him a lot of lead time. Lady Katara is of the opinion he may not want to be stuck in one city ever again, having seen the world."

Telen closed her eyes, then opened them as though having ciphered something out.

"Which would leave Bumi, as the descendant of a past King's son also currently enthroned, as a reasonable and likely candidate for the Enduring Throne-Bumi or possibly his successor."

Mai looked at the older woman.

"You're planning to move the Earth Kingdom capital to Omashu?"

"My dear-two things. I am always planning to better the status of my city and its people. That you may consider a given. Two - if you have questions about your parents, aren't you talking to the wrong noblewoman?"

This was a point Mai found she had no refutation for, and so left to find her parents' well-furnished but still humbler than she could have once imagined apartments.

"Mai?"

"Mother, I-we need to-"

"Talk? Yes, of course. But later, dear-after the ceremony."

"Why does that sound so familiar?"

"I know it does. But just one more time, please?"

To have her snark acknowledged was almost a shock to Mai's system. The next such thing was quick in coming.

"Will you hold Tom-Tom as well? I have to stand by your father. Oh, this is such a big day!"

"Mother, your dress and make-up-I don't know if they pass muster-by the standards you taught me."

Shira glanced at herself in the mirror.

"Everyone will just have to understand. It's been a busy day. Now let's go!"

Mai looked at her little brother in abject wonder.

"Did our Mom just shrug and say 'Ehhh-Good Enough'? Cause our Mom doesn't do that."

They were escorted and guided into seats at Bumi's Main Hall. Mai breathed in and recalled the tale of the upper-school girl tormented by pranksters at a gala event - the very night she realized she was the new Avatar. Kyoshite purists claimed strongly it wasn't her, but even Aang had to wonder.

"Hopefully, there's no pig's-blood here, big fella."

Mai found herself distracted by the little one's cooing, and comforted by the feeling of holding her own flesh and blood so close. She recalled the newly-artistic Sokka's rendition of Tom-Tom's face mixed with Zuko's-and then once again saw a room full of quarrelling teen girls with Azula's face and Mai's own eyes.

"On second thought, pig'-blood might not be so bad after all. Yeesh. Hey, Toph..."

But her ears were too distracted for the Earthbender to hear, so she walked by her recent companion to the never-used Bei Fong box. Mai had a thought, and tried to put it into action.

"Excuse me? Are there any...messenger hawks available?"

"One is going out right after the ceremony, Lady Mai."

"Ummm, great. Here's another message for it."

It would be a game of tag, but Zuko would know what to do with it. Bumi rose, and the ceremony started.

"We proudly add to the citizenry of Omashu two former members of the Fire Nation this day. They came in as conquerors, and so defeated, we get to say what we do with them. Their former Fire Lord-who had his butt-ocks kicked soundly by my best friend-likely expected we'd execute them. Well, that's why he's powerless and rotting in a cell while my best friend's new friend runs near the whole blasted world in his place. The Earth abides, it does not burn. Now, walking in, they were brash and bold, but while that ugly statue went up, no slaughter was called, and we can't say that for every conquest the Fire Nation made, even if I told everyone to stand down. But also unlike some of their peers, Valtin and Shira have come out and said that they want a change-not a change in who won, but in who they serve, and how they serve. They've given back to the city they took, and they want to keep on doing so. So, while under yearly probation and under terms of permanent community service, we welcome our former conquerors as the people down the way who just moved in, and want a fresh start. Is this unusual? Yep! But Omashu was unusually founded, and we keep renewing the foundations with unusual. Keeps us strong. Especially when it was also unusual of them to help save everyone from when Ozai went LULU! So welcome to the Earth Kingdom, Valtin and Shira, along with their children-though I hear tell the Fire Lord may want some of that property for himself!"

Mai blushed, and a few in the crowd winced at the innuendo-laden pun. Valtin stood up.

"I proclaimed myself a conqueror over barbarians when I arrived. I told myself I was the extended hand of a fire-wielding deity when I first walked these streets. It is now that this barbarian asks the civilized folk to allow him to continue to help in his small ways. If you allow this, you will not regret it."

Mai shook her head. Could that even be her father? He doubted he was that good an actor, so he must have meant his words. Shira rose next.

"As my daughter will doubtless tell you, at one time, only the endless rising of my family's banner and status concerned me at all. It was only before my son's conception that I began to realize how miserable my ambition had made her-had indeed made us all. It was only your charity after our nation's defeat and withdrawal that made me realize how my people's ambition had brought misery to the whole world over. I am supposed to be a designer, a crafter of events and shows and spectacles, all meant to dazzle and allure. Never once did I pick up that tablecloth or pull away those curtains to see the mess underneath. I see it now- I want a chance to clean it up - for Omashu - and for my children, especially my daughter, whose beautiful smile I erased-"

One of the court ladies moved to support Shira, but Mai raced to her side instead, Tom-Tom in hand, and-a slight smile on her face.

"You didn't have to do it so publicly, you know."

"Never lecture Mother on decorum, dear-now let's stand together as a family."

There was applause, and the conquerors were instead the conquered. All seemed well, until Bumi spoke.

"Well, enough with the apologies and tears and explanations-let's eat!"

Before the King could so much as take a mouthful, a voice rang out.

"No more explanations? How's about changing that to one more explanation, your Majesty?"

Bumi looked over at Toph. His face drew tight.

"Gonna be waiting a long time for anything like that kid. I have nothing to explain. Now's let's hunker down and honor our former members of the Fire Nation."

Mai knew Toph's beef was a just one, but still tried for calm.

"Toph, not now...please."

"Sorry, Mai-and to your folks. Beautiful speeches, particularly Lady Shira. But I was offered a sour trade by your King. So I'm going to do another import from the Fire Nation."

Toph rose on a column of Earth before Bumi.

"As King, you have the right to blow me off. So I want your throne, old man."

Bumi got up and grinned.

"Are you sayin' those magic words to me, Girly-Girl?"

If the words were literally and regionally inappropriate, the intent they conveyed was lost on no one as Toph spoke and pointed.

"Agni Kai!"

Mai's parents and much of the crowd gasped. Tom-Tom looked confused to see two of his favorite people angry at each other. Mai turned her head, looked at the seats of the leading nobles - and there she saw Lady Telen.

"She's-smiling?"

_**TO BE CONCLUDED...**_


	3. Chapter 3

Mai had wondered why Sokka of all people was becoming such a close friend. Yes, he had his own appeal, but her sights had been fixed on Zuko since before hormones was anything but a word you giggled about, so it wasn't that. He could be funny, but it was a bit of a gamble between that and his falling completely flat-though the gamble alone had its appeal to a girl who spent seeming lifetimes waiting for something to happen. The man who was smart even before his recent bout with-eccentricity, she told herself, always eccentricity-was also the man who was apt to have pastry-eating contests with Toph and Iroh.

"The time has come to stop this! It's already gone way too far as it is."

She gained a partial insight when, minus a palace-bound Zuko, the new expanded group had spent a week seeking out the escape routes that Zuko's mother might have taken, all those years ago (not that many in the counting, but lifetimes in the heart). Recent notes found in Ozai's work quarters (as opposed to his vastly more palatial-looking private quarters, where _*no one else*_ went), indicated that the new Fire Lord had turned on his wife with a speed that might have surprised even Azula. There were soldiers looking for her almost as she made her devil's deal with the man she once loved, to spare her son's life. The nearly-almost Fire Lady had been exactly that good in making her getaway, and arguments began to erupt between of all people, Aang and Katara, over what to do and how to search next.

"There are still forces seeking to disrupt a very new and very fragile peace. A fight like this could embolden them."

While the pair that were sometimes like lovebirds and all the time like the strongest of friends fought it out like armadillo bears, Sokka merely sat and checked off all the routes they had already gone over. When the pair inevitably demanded that he choose a side, Sokka chose his own and commented how sad a thing it was that this petty bickering meant that, on this one occasion, he was the most mature of the original trio. Properly shamed, the other two relented and the search resumed, for all it really brought.

"How are you going to explain this to our friends, especially Aang? Why don't you call him? He found a way to keep Ozai's sorry hide alive. He could solve this."

But Mai had learned something during that fruitless search. Sokka was her friend and ally because he was utterly self-aware. Except for his accidentally-improved drawing skills, he was never _*I'm Not Like That*_ about his flaws. To a girl raised in a world of social denial for advancement, self-aware was a good way to be, and if he kept Zuko that way by influence, all the better. But sometimes, self-aware was admitting when you had found that proverbial stone wall.

"Blast it, Toph! You're not some egoist showboat who needs to lash out on tiny issues of pride and place. That's not you!"

Toph stopped her frenzied practice session long enough to walk over to her lecturer.

"I am a former Professional Bend-Grappling CHAMPION! I come from the most ostentatiously wealthy, image-obsessed family in the entire WORLD! I joined with the risen Avatar and saved said entire world, and I can say that my ears were among the first to hear Ozai grovel like a whipped-errr, former tyrant-darn, Sokka makes that sound so easy. ANYWAY, what part of all that makes you think ego and pride are unknown to me?"

Maybe Toph was not quite as self-aware. But she spoke straight, and nothing in her fighting Bumi, in victory or defeat, would have her speaking the truth with quite the verve she did now.

"What he did was low. What he did next was even lower. Royal privilege should not be invoked to cover up a blunder. But maybe you, in the midst of three or five levels of upset, shouldn't be challenging a master of his experience. You've seen he's no paper tiger."

Toph threw a huge disc-shaped slab into the air, let it fall directly above her, and kept it suspended for fifteen seconds with one finger and all will before smashing it.

"Somehow, somewhere, someone in this world or the next decided it's okay to put the brave little blind girl off and pat her on the head while dismissing her. That ends here!"

Mai was beginning to get sickly worried. All of her friends, old and new, cared for _*the brave little blind girl*_, especially her crushes Zuko and Sokka, who, once slapped into awareness of her feelings, now felt responsible for her. The possibility that she could get hurt or hurt Bumi on her watch, so to speak, was not allowable.

"She was never a friend, let's face it. But watching Azula dissolve into madness was not how I would have liked to see her brought down-"

The little girl was a titan by comparison to the skilled warrior. But still Mai spoke truth to power.

"You're losing it, Toph. And what you're losing is hard to get-"

Mai was not harmed, but a virtual escalator of Earth quickly guided her well away from Toph's practice grounds.

"-back. And I know you can still hear me-jerk."

Mai knew it was a fair hike to Bumi's practice grounds - each combatant had taken pains to put the other as far away as humanly possible. So Mai applied a principle that the briefly mad/brilliant Sokka had put into her head. Firing off her blades at the main wall, she allowed her cloaks to charge from the static she built up while running, till ascending that same wall was almost like gliding up. Unfortunately, her absent-minded friend and ally failed to mention that it might be an idea to have a way to safely discharge all that power. A corner of the highest wall, buttressed by metal and wet from light rain nearly fried her till she leaped away.

"Dope-not to mention the dope who heeded his advice."

Still, it had been a kick, and it seemed like kicks just kept getting harder to find. She ran along the edge of the wall, surprising sentries and guards till she reached sight of Bumi's practice area. Wisely, she gave the guards some relief by dismounting outside the entryway and explaining herself. While not delighted to see anyone from the Fire Nation, their attitude was surprisingly practical.

"Lady Mai, if you can talk him out of this madness, more power to you. But be warned : Your mother tried her best as well, to no result."

"Yeah? Well, I'm not my mother. I'm not even sure I like the guy."

"There's-quite a bit of that going around. In your father's name, please enter."

That sort of comment disturbed Mai more than she cared to admit. It seemed like a good portion of the city was rooting not for their king, but for the girl who had so brazenly challenged him. Mai knew this tendency. Bumi had left Omashu to save the entire world, but to his subjects' eyes, he had chiefly left them behind, without even instructions on how to run things in his absence. It could not have sat well with some that it was the imprisoned former Fire Nation colonial governor who had acted decisively to save them all from his own people's insanity.

"Save your speechmaking, woman-I'm playing in the sand!"

Indeed he was, though his grip on his playground seemed nowhere near as sure as his work with stone and other earth, even metal.

"I don't do speeches. And I guess it is a good strategy."

It had struck Mai, as she made her approach, that she had no standing to chastise Bumi. She would gladly do it, but what would it accomplish? Her mother had been this man's palace caretaker for months, and had likely failed to get him to so much as delay the challenge. Even with Zuko, she occasionally had to remind herself that she was dealing with a crown-level figure, and that was with a deep childhood connection.

"Hmph! So what strategy am I using?"

Mai had walked around two massive royal egos in her time, so she knew that getting Bumi to ask the questions was not only the logical way to go - it was perhaps her only hope. On a very basic level, the man had the power to banish or even kill her with just a few words.

"You've heard, probably from Sokka-love the guy but he can never shut up-that while Toph may have mastered metal, she still has major problems with sand."

Bumi almost imperceptibly raised his control level over the shifting piles around him.

"Wrong sib. It was Katara told me that, while asking me about the water content of rocks and boulders. She even claimed she can do the water in a body's blood. For real?"

"All too real. Just ask her brother. And while you're at it, ask both of them about Toph's tendency to work doubly hard at controlling anything that seems beyond her."

Bumi stopped playing in the sand, and bulked himself out. He practiced moving about in this top-heavy form, so to increase his speed when he did use this form.

"Seems like I could just as easily ask you. You know them all by now. What made you decide to jump ship?"

Mai had two easy answers for that one.

"My love for Zuko. My contempt for Azula. As to knowing them all well, if we are friends, then we're still new friends. My connection to these heroes is not fully formed, just yet, though we're getting there."

Bumi deliberately rose up on one very uneven column of rock, with his other leg dangling out as he fought for balance.

"Define-getting there."

She did just that.

"Aang has my gratitude for taking down the man who hurt my man. Katara is the kind of sister-in-law-ish type I would have wished for, the kind of sister Zuko deserves. There's a bit of flirt under their eyes, but nothing I can't handle. Sokka is the only other person on Earth who recognizes that this new celebrity Fire Lord is really another teenager who needs to rest, goof off and eat junk food. I'm actually scared that we're both away from Zuko right now."

Bumi kept right on re-training his balance, with not even a glance at Mai to complete her take on the Avatar's bunch.

"Toph I think I actually feel closest to, strictly by circumstance. A lot more common history than I would have imagined. I think my family wanted to be the Bei Fongs at one point, though its only now, when everything they had wanted is gone, that I see my folks happy. I feel sorry for Toph. I doubt her parents could ever wake up from their problems. She's been hurt a lot. I'd prefer that she not be hurt anymore."

Mai made her plea.

"Please call off the challenge."

"I'm not the one who made it!"

"But you are the King. You can declare it invalid for any number of reasons."

Bumi turned away while making a left to right slicing motion with his hand.

"Not gonna happen. I don't back down."

"What will this battle prove? What do you need to prove, that battling a girl ninety years your junior will accomplish it?"

Bumi's face puffed, and he cried out. As he did, the earth around him seemed to lend him a sheen of energy, and the sound of an engine louder than that of the Ba Sing Se Drill.

"THAT I AM KING BUMI, AND WHEN IT COMES TO THE EARTH BENT, EVEN THE AVATAR HAS GOT ALL JACK ON ME!"

The sheen and the sound did not fade quickly, and Mai stood stunned while Bumi smiled and quipped.

"Just sayin'."

Finally back at her parents' chambers, Mai was ready to admit defeat. She saw her little brother sit up in his crib, smiling at her presence. She almost smiled back.

"Tom-Tom, when it comes to playing peacemaker, I stink worse than one of Suki's attempts to talk trash."

And few things, it was known, stank worse than that, though a couple of Iroh and Sokka's puns, and one of the Mechanist's mathematical jokes, came awfully, awfully close.

"Trying to outdo your old mother, eh?"

Mai didn't look up.

"Yeah, well, I figured it beat trying to stab you with a trowel."

"Huh?"

"Sorry, Mom. It's from one of Ty Lee's tales of the 'Walking Chi-Less'."

Lady Shira picked up her son.

"I could never get into those."

Even this simple conversation took all the enthusiasm Mai could muster.

"They're not for everyone. A little vivid, even for my tastes."

"It's not the gore, my dear. It's the people in them. They panic so easily, and make the worst sort of choices based on that panic. Logic seems to be suspended, not only in the Chi-Less Ones' very existence, but in all the advantages the tellers of these stories seem anxious to give them, both in terms of abilities, and the foolishness of the living."

Mai actually found herself wanting to lightly chuckle.

"Sadly, Mother, a story that goes 'They all learned to overcome their differences, cooperated fully and survived the monsters' onslaught' wouldn't draw much of an audience."

For the record, Mai saw the irony in her words even as she spoke them. But for her, the fact that the one she despised most in the world would one day be her sister was all the irony she cared to deal with on a day to day basis.

"But Mai, isn't that what we all have to do? Isn't exactly that the grandest and most savage lesson of this ruinous war?"

Mai wasn't being chastised for lying down while her mother spoke, but specters of chastisements past finally roused her and she sat up.

"And what if you and Father hadn't been ruined by the war?"

Shira seemed to gain a thoughtful look her eldest would have once sworn she couldn't even fake.

"I honestly cannot conceive of life other than how it has gone. When Bumi freed this city, he freed us, whether he wanted to or not. Running the-uhhm-running-of this palace is something that suits me, as being back to Inventory Control suits your Father. To answer your question, Mai : If I met some manner of parallel Shira who lived in a world where Avatar Aang had never returned, I would wait for her to mock my position-I used to be very good at that. I would then ask her how many requests she receives from Azula and Ozai on a weekly basis. Because if, in war, that number merely overwhelmed me, for that other Shira, in final peace, I think it would make her bald."

Mai looked in her mother's eyes.

"You really are happy now, aren't you?"

Shira pulled her girl close.

"Happy enough to risk the Fire Lord's ire and ask that my daughter move back here with us, until he decides to make you his bride. So what's the delay?"

Glad to push thoughts of whiny Earth-Benders out of her mind, Mai almost cheerfully answered a question most young women she knew cringed at.

"The world. Zuko is its ruler, thought that's the last thing he ever wanted. Kuei may simply never return to the Enduring Throne in Ba Sing Se, some former colonies you'd think would want us out now don't want to be left without protection. Then there's the merchants, who all worship the free land access that only endures so long as Zuko's decrees hold sway over all lands. Aang is doing all he can - shoring up a needed dam here, tearing down a less-than-helpful one over here. He and Katara have cut so many irrigation ditches, sea levels could drop. Even before his-weird injury-Sokka had some ideas that probably kept us from facing a military mutiny, and also prevented any ready-made armies for the next Ozai/Azula wannabe. And Toph? Before her idiot parents sent those scrolls of doom and gloom-yes that's me saying doom and gloom, go figure-she 'reformatted' the Boiling Rock into a trade center-that your brother now admins. He said he prefers crooks to traders - more honest."

Shira showed her joy at having such a simple conversation.

"You wrote that he aided your release from prison. But I had been told that his rank had been taken from him, after you aided Zuko's escape."

Mai opened a carafe of tea. It was barely warm, but it soothed her throat.

"Good. Well, it was a lot like here with Father. With Ozai and Azula down and away, the guards needed an able administrator. Unc-he tried not to hold a grudge when Zuko came to claim the throne. In between all that, he ordered me and Ty Lee let go. But once it all fell into Zuko's lap, it was a lot like it all fell into his lap. So-we want to delay any royal wedding till we see if the kingdom can hold together. Does that make sense?"

Shira had been changing Tom-Tom while listening.

"Better sense than you know. I'd read that, before this age of war, the marrying age was actually rising, even in the most remote areas of the world. If we truly have peace, why rush things?"

Mai began to feel sleepy, and let her consciousness slip on a characteristically cynical note.

"If...we truly have peace."

She rose after not much sleep, as she sensed an intruder and caught a blade not unlike her own, using candle-lighters for safety against poisons.

"A note?"

But the blade was not poisoned, and was in fact an invitation to spar in her own learned style.

"Lady-what are you up to?"

Mai emerged into Lady Telen's house and was greeted by about a dozen blades. She dodged nearly all of them, blocking the few that remained with her long sleeves.

"You can do better than that, so why bother?"

Telen emerged with a young woman in tow. The younger woman's face was partially covered by a battle-mask.

"I just wanted to see if Blade-Mistress Anka still taught only the best, my dear."

Mai nodded.

"She-will never retire. My knuckles still feel her fan rapping them."

Telen held up the back of one hand.

"She never lets anyone forget that, Mai. But that little show aside, I didn't bring you to fight this old hen. Oma-remove your mask."

The younger-though hardly truly young any longer, despite good looks-woman did just that, revealing a pleasant face, with hair that seemed slightly off-kilter and one eye that seemed just a bit larger than the other. Mai had no doubt who she was looking at.

"So when did all this occur-and why I am not addressing her as Princess Oma?"

Oma smiled.

"Because my father can be a stubborn idiot."

Telen had the three sit down for tea.

"I was Bumi's third or fourth cousin, and even with forty years on me, he still looked so good. Given his legendary flightiness, I knew if I held out, I could live my dream and be his bride. The bride part I got. The dream? I stopped waiting for that to come true when our daughter turned sixteen."

Oma nodded.

"He was my best friend growing up. But there are times when a girl-well, this girl-wants a father, not a BFF. My mother laid down an ultimatum about his role in my life-and well, you've seen how well he takes ultimatums. I knew his being the King might get in the way of things. But so much of his psyche was invested in remaining the boy who played on the mail chutes with the Avatar. Respect to Avatar Aang, but as his daughter or as his friend, I was tired of competing with a dead boy for his attention. I said as much."

While Mai deeply sympathized, she felt compelled to bring up a recent subject.

"Lady Telen, I saw you smile when Toph made her challenge. Is it your plan to take the throne for your daughter if Bumi gets beaten?"

Telen shook her head.

"As part of the separation agreement, Oma can never be queen. That was-that was Bumi's ultimatum in response to mine, and I've never been very good at backing down myself. You want to know my sinister plan, Mai? I want Toph Bei Fong to take my man's big toy away from him. This will accomplish several things. One, we will have a monarch all can respect, a member of the Avatar's group who saved this world. Two, despite their own mythic stubbornness, the Bei Fongs will have no choice but to finally acknowledge their child, breaking Omashu's long standing as a second rate colony. Add that to the practical elevation the city has since the fall of Ba Sing Se, we will become the new center of the Earth Kingdom, to the extent that matters."

Mai felt a bit confused at those words.

"How can that not matter?"

Oma shrugged.

"Mai, your parents now live here, by choice and by decree. That means you will at least visit here regularly. And you being here means that, as boyfriend, fiancé and eventually husband, so will the guy who rules the whole world. That will mean Omashu will have to make a place for the Fire Lord and Lady to stay-maybe in a second world capital?"

Mai was running around the bases to emotion, this time with suspicion.

"And if not queen mother or queen regnant, what do you two get out of it?"

Telen explained in terms not sinister at all.

"All those what-if's are wonderful, and I am a fierce advocate for my city. But if Bumi is just a man, then Oma and I can tell him-be a man with your family once again."

Mai had seen the tears in Telen's eyes, and had by now judged them to be real.

"Still? After all he's done?"

Oma chuckled, and in that was a faint echo of a royal cackle.

"You're asking us that? The girl who went to call her deserter boyfriend out, and that same day, betrayed your nation's lunatic rulers to see him go free, at the expense of your own freedom-for all you knew, your life?"

Telen moved to finish the impromptu get-together.

"Mai-stop trying to get those Earth-sized egos to stand down. I've seen Toph fight. She can take him, and in that path, so many good things will follow for us all. Let it be. Please."

Oma looked a decade or more older than Mai, and she was likely older than that, doing the math. But the plea in her eyes was from one teen girl to another-_*let me know my Dad at last.* _ It also didn't escape Mai's attention that Bumi had formed a bond with her little brother, perhaps indicating a man who missed having a family. Her wanderings were part of a daze after that.

Mai was back at her parents' quarters in time to find her father flipping a fried wolverostrich egg for breakfast.

"Making your own food?"

Valtin cracked another one for his tired-looking daughter.

"Your mother had the servants supervising the food needs of the observers of the upcoming ego-fest between Bumi and your friend. Besides, I can make a fried egg myself. I'm told you made the rounds as well-even to Telen and her daughter."

"You know about Oma?"

"Most everyone does-but saying it out loud is a good way for a former governor to lose his cushy parole. None of them budged?"

Mai put obscene amounts of pepper on her egg as it was served.

"Sorry-wolverostrich eggs have an aftertaste. Yeah-if anything, my bumbling locked their positions in even tighter. Father, I know I'm not the queen of social graces - but my best got me less than nothing to show for my efforts."

Valtin grated a little cheese on his cooling egg, and then onto Mai's.

"The world is in a sorry shape because of our people-yet we did in effect conquer the world. Part of how we did it was not merely brute force but patience. Sozin knew the Air Nomads would be a target, so he readied his armies to go to all those places the Nomads said we never could reach. Same with the two biggest cities in the Earth Kingdom. I will no longer brag about all that in quite the way I once did. But it remains a fact - we Fire Folk have a way of beating obstacles that everyone says cannot be beaten."

Mai knew all the qualifiers her father was placing on such grim subject matter. That was not what bothered her.

"You don't have an army, and you don't have scientists. So how do we end this?"

"We don't, Mai-at least not our entire family, though we'll all play a part."

Valtin looked into her uncharacteristically wide eyes.

"Only one member of our clan can stop this pointless fight."


	4. Chapter 4

Toph was in the process of deliberately over-oxygenating her cells by breathing just as Aang taught her. Somehow, this secret Air Nomad method did not involve dizziness or risk death. However, the breaths involved were so noisy, the rarest of events took place as she readied herself for the minutes-away battle with Bumi. She was taken entirely by surprise.

"Yahhhhhh!"

Mai had to dodge a few thrown rocks, but, having lived through Azula's uncommon but memorable tantrums (before she dropped to an eerie calm and began her next plan), she was quite adept at side-stepping the unexpected.

"What? Have you been drinking some of Iroh's Cougfhee?"

"YOU SCARED THE LIFE OUT OF ME!"

"Hey, I thought you were snoring! You all right?"

Toph waved a hand in the air.

"Yeah. I just-I _*never*_ get taken by surprise anymore. So? Here to make one last effort to talk me out of this 'madness'?"

Toph knew that Mai would never engage in the kind of pointless flustered refutation that Aang and Katara (and maybe Zuko) would. No, Mai would hand her snark back to her, and this was among the beginnings of a very good friendship.

"I think this mess is fueled by ego, pride and stupidity-but I've seen madness. This doesn't make that cut."

"Good to know. So-why _*are*_ you here?"

Mai surprised the Earthbender by continuing to stay away from stopping or persuading her from the coming confrontation.

"To wish you luck. Then, I plan to wish Bumi luck. Any problem with that?"

"No-he's been good to your family."

Mai closed her eyes.

"They were extremely lucky. By many lights, they should be in prison."

"Harsh much?"

"You know what I mean. That's the way war ends. But this one-"

Toph felt the exact vibe she was searching for.

"It's like we've all been lucky. Maybe too lucky. I thought I'd be helping Zuko fight off reprisals from rogue Earth Kingdom and Water Tribe types-but for now, everyone seems so happy that the war is over, that-sorry-the Fire Nation got a huge pass."

It was ground they had both covered before, but it was still largely Terra Incognita in terms of answers. Mai didn't shrug, but her voice conveyed just that tone.

"Don't be sorry. If we're smart, we'll do something to earn that pass back again. Zuko and Sokka are looking at aid packages that don't overburden the average subject with taxes. He's hoping that, by the time the party ends, we'll have cleaned up enough to mute the remaining resentment. Aang is hitting every place he can find that needs help, and knocking on doors about where King Kuei is. While he was craz-ummm-in his Sokka State-"

"Sokka State-really?"

Mai conceded the awkwardness of her phrase without much comment.

"Don't push. While he was out there, he ciphered out that maybe our moving fast on all these fronts has changed what would have been six or eight months of Zuko's Bonfire to eighteen months and even to two years. That's still not a lot of time."

"Well, Aang had less than a year after waking up."

Mai couldn't dispute that, but both young women were worried far more than even they themselves could know-and in this, all their friends, old and new, were right there with them.

Toph began pushing against a large stone without bending, merely getting its measure and the measure of its 'sibling' around it. Like so much in her method, this was largely self-taught.

"I-uhhh-find that madness is like humidity."

Mai blinked twice in deep confusion.

"Okay, not following you at all."

Toph was now shouldering her 'opponent'.

"Ahhh-well, you know how when, it's really hot and humid, and then all of a sudden, the humidity pulls out, and its suddenly really nice and cool? Then, the clouds burst like a Waterbender who waited too long to pee."

"I actually never took note of that-but yeah. It does do that."

Toph was now on her back, reading the stone deeply with her feet.

"Mai, madness is like that. It's just like that. My folks would seem to calm down and loosen up, and it always was followed by some new restriction on my movements."

Mai had actually hoped never to find a rival for the depths of her cynicism.

"Ozai, and Azulon before him, would follow the news of a great victory not with leave for the soldiers, but with a new campaign. My father once told me that this habit helped create the Anti-Mutiny squads."

Toph ended her exercises and went to dress for the event.

"So where's all of our madness gone?"

Before either could attempt to answer this question, a girl neither knew walked up and had a question of her own.

"Excuse me-but is it true that you two know Avatar Aang?"

"Know him? I taught him."

"He's my boyfriend's best friend and ally."

The girl nodded.

"Cool! My name's Meng. My folks had to flee here from Makapu Village when my uncle started a resistance against the scum of the Fire Nation-ehhh, no offense."

Mai could tell this kid had trouble not tripping over things, words or objects.

"None taken."

Meng smiled and kept on.

"Annnnnd do you also know if he's still seeing a girl named Katara?"

Mai felt something odd when this girl spoke, but couldn't place it.

"Yeah-they're very much together. Inseparable, really."

Toph agreed.

"I'd say marriage within five years is a given."

Meng threw up her arms, gained a disgusted look, and began to walk away.

"I KNEW IT! That shameless hussy is exploiting her inside track! An honest girl hasn't got a snowball's chance..."

"Toph?"

"Yeah, Mai?"

"Did that girl sound familiar to you at all?"

Toph shrugged.

"I don't think she sounds that much like Ty Lee."

Mai avoided asking if Toph were serious about Meng's voice, fearing that she was. The confused girlfriend of the Fire Lord wished her well once more, then walked away, not giving voice to her suspicions that, if anyone could draw in madness for a coming storm, it was the girl she once followed, now reportedly ever deeper in her insanity.

"Who am I kidding? She's in a rubber room with rubber sheets wearing rubber robes, her only weapons stench and drool-and a lot of that-am I saying all this out loud?"

Toph's voice in the distance confirmed this, so a blushing Mai made quickly for Bumi's. Her reception there was not much different.

"Don't you even start on me!"

The young warrior found that feigning indifference after a life of often being indifferent wasn't that great a chore.

"So who's starting? I came to wish you well, just like I did for Toph."

Bumi was rolling on a gigantic stone that Mai realized had once been the head of Ozai. She found once again she had no objection to this at all.

"So? Which set of bleachers are you and your folks sitting in?"

"We found our own seating."

Bumi puzzled at this.

"There's only two sets of bleachers."

Mai shrugged.

"Let's just say we found a prime spot to watch the whole mess go down, and leave it at that. Don't worry - you'll know we're there."

As she turned and left, Bumi made what amounted to an astonishing concession.

"On the off-chance that little brat gets the better of me, I'll make her promise to continue sponsoring your family here. I owe them that much."

Something like sobriety had entered the loopy voice of the King. Was defeat the only possibility on his mind? Mai kept this speculation to herself as she walked away.

"Thanks. It's appreciated."

She stopped dead in her tracks, looked back at Bumi and said additional words that were not completely Mai-like.

"I really mean that. Because nothing is more important than family."

She picked up her pace as she went away from him for real, not allowing a rebuttal or question about what she had just said. Presuming Telen and Oma weren't playing her entirely, Mai felt Bumi deserved to stew on that thought.

As Bumi arrived at the Agni Kai battlegrounds, Poli pointed to the two opposing sets of bleachers.

"In order to keep fights from breaking out, the two sides each agreed to keep to one set of bleachers or the other. The right side is for Toph's supporters."

Bumi looked to the left and waved.

"And those are my supporters?"

An apple-pepper and an egg hit the king. Poli shook his head.

"No-the left side is for people who think that a monarchical succession shouldn't be decided this way, and that you should simply abdicate in favor of Toph."

Bumi fumed.

"Have to see about reinstating those sedition laws. Well, who's cheering for me?"

"I will-if you'll let me."

Oma smiled at her father, and he smiled back.

"Why do you and your mother always forgive me?"

Oma broke into an almost Bumi-esque cackle. It had thrown more than a few potential suitors off.

"Probably for the same reason the Avatar's friends didn't try to press kidnapping charges!"

Both cackled together, and Poli winced openly.

"Cree-py."

Bumi wiped his eyes.

"I do tend to dodge Karma, don't I-"

Again, a more serious man emerged.

"Today-though, I dunno. This kid is good. I dodge as well as ever, but I don't move as well. Karma might be of a mind to slap me around a bit."

Oma hugged the man who at times took pains to neither mention nor refer to her.

"Beat her. She's still a kid up against an Old Master. Then Mother and I will bind up your wounds. But why don't you just tell her what she wants to know, and let there be peace?"

An ornate belt landed at Bumi's feet. A voice dripping with confidence was heard.

"Hey, Old Man? That's my Bend-Grappling Championship belt from back home. You might need it to keep your dignity when I BEAT THE PANTS OFF OF YOU!"

Oma looked at her father.

"Forget what I just said. Daddy-beat her into Tyrkinsa Paste. Become that thing she hears in her worst nightmares!"

The princess of Omashu shouted at the would-be usurper.

"I don't care how your eyes work, girlie-you are gonna SEE STARS!"

Toph smiled.

"Now, you're someone I can respect, Oma! And later on-I'll be paying my respects."

Standing next to Poli, Aedren shook his head.

"The fate of a great city-state-decided by trash talk."

The arena was entered by spectator and combatant alike, and the announcer rose to proclaim its start.

"We stand now as witnesses to the first-ever Agni Kai in Earth Kingdom history. The winner of this match will be the undisputed ruler of the City Of The Two Lovers. But there is no love lost between our Benders. In this corner, our current ruler, King Bumi of the line of Terronius The Dim!"

As at least a few cheers went up for him, Bumi reflected on his remote ancestor.

"I mean, really! Who lets themselves be labeled 'The Dim'?"

The announcer bowed to his current liege, then looked at Toph.

"In this corner, the runaway heiress of the Bei Fong Clan, whose current leaders had our messenger arrested for spreading wild rumors when he delivered the invitations!"

Toph shook her head.

"Okay, that settles it-Sokka and Katara's Dad is totally adopting me."

The announcer looked out at the two sets of bleachers.

"Is there general assent for this?"

The crowd yelled out as one, and the subjects of Omashu made the Earth shake by voice acclamation.

"AGNI KAI!"

The announcer made a gesture all involved knew as useless.

"I ask now : Can our combatants avoid this conflict and come to terms?"

Toph briefly unnerved Bumi by somehow meeting his gaze, but did not allow himself to so much as flinch. The two combatants responded one just a little after the other, yet with the same words.

"THERE ARE NO TERMS!"

Toph smiled and pulled back into a fighting stance.

"I chose this style to honor my friend and student, Avatar Aang."

As she began, one member of the crowd whispered to another.

"I thought his name was pronounced _Ong."_

His friend rolled his eyes.

"I have an idiot sitting next to me."

Bumi made his declaration.

"I chose this style to honor my oldest friend, Avatar Aang-whom I ended up sending to the sorriest excuse for a teacher on this planet!"

Rather than further meeting his taunt, Toph rose in a crane stance. Her face lost all traces of humor, echoing Katara and Sokka's vivid descriptions of the terrifying look Aang's face took on in the Avatar State.

"What is that girl doing?"

Bumi's deliberately low-whispered query was quickly answered. As Toph kept still, rocks with traces of coal were made to collide with others, and mud was drawn up from where an early morning cloudburst had struck. Behind her, a series of stones moved in a circular motion. The mud-stream kept her linked with all the objects under her command.

"In honor of the Avatar, King Of Liars, face the four elements!"

Bumi was prepared to seize control of the mud-stream as she hurled it at him, but not for her neat twist. As the mud flew, Toph grunted and pulled the earth right out of the mix. His eyes were assaulted by a hot, gritty spray of water that he had next to no chance of stopping.

"Awww...need to dry off?"

The coal-laden rocks had caught fire, and that fire was drawn back into the wind-tunnel created by the whirling rocks. The audience gasped as Toph sent a pillar of fire at their wayward king. Even with his speed and strength, Bumi was singed as he evaded this highly unexpected assault.

The announcer stated what the crowd had already seen, but they raised no objection, the result of not believing their own eyes.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, Lady Toph Bei Fong has just done what no bender outside the Avatars has ever done-effectively wielded all four elements! We are living witnesses to history!"

Toph was now winning over even the part of the crowd that had objected to this battle. Sensing this, she pointed at where Bumi's breathing originated from.

"Give it up, King Bumi. You don't have a prayer of beating someone who can do what I can."

Bumi saw how this effort had tired her, and he was ready.

"You sure work hard, Kiddo!"

Toph was still breathing hard, but kept herself aware of her opponent, so as not to be simply pushed over.

"Always."

Bumi smiled, and his voice carried every inch of that wild grin.

"So much wisdom, and yet you still haven't learned-"

Bumi created two perfectly circular stone balls, and began to ride them like Aang would his balls of air. He hopped from one to the other, his feet never touching the ground and almost flying as he arced between hops.

"-NEVER work as hard as you play!"

Toph was now at a severe disadvantage. Bumi had obviously heard the tale of her defeat by Aang in the arena, and had taken things a step further. Now, not only was her opponent impossible to sense via footfall, but the noise generated by the two stones effectively ate up Bumi's transit sounds as he leapt back and forth.

"You think this is gonna stop me, old man?"

One of the boulder-balls splashed water and mud onto Toph, increasing her rage ever further, to say nothing of what Bumi's wild laughter and taunts did. Her blocking of his stone-pellets was becoming frenzied, and her awesome-yet-showy attack routine had left her somewhat drained.

"I'm thinkin' that, yeah. Tell me, kid-is all this worth a throne?"

Toph knew it was time to unleash her secret weapon.

"Throne, Schmone! I just wanted the throne so I can force the truth out of you on WHY YOU SCAMMED ME!"

The old man grinned anew, and again Toph could feel it forming.

"Ain't gonna happen, girlie! I'm enjoying watching you squirm."

Bumi was certain he had found his center; a cocky opponent brought low, the proof that his fun-loving style was a winner now apparent to all doubters. Maybe even his family back at exactly the right time. But Toph was about to take the air out of him on more than one level.

"You want to go fun-loving, King Bumi? Huh? Well, I happen to be best friends with a goof-ball who makes you look like the Loser-Lord you are. He can be serious when he needs to, and not only pass gas but make painfully funny jokes about passing gas. Even his sister has to flee the room after shaming him for them, so she can laugh in private. I aped Aang before, but now I give you-Sokka!"

There was a black gauntlet on Toph's left arm, made from a special material that she had played with like nobody's business. At her will, the space-rock left over from a lost sword's forging was reshaped from the gauntlet into a bo-staff, long and capable of growing longer. She caused the earth beneath her feet to move her in a circle, and the staff became an increasing hazard to Bumi's navigation and hopping.

"Hey! Watch it with that thing-I'm gonna-"

The staff never touched him, but one of his higher-arcing avoidance hops was thrown off, and so was he. He hit the mud with a satisfying plop.

"Oh, how the mighty have-HEY!"

Glancing up, Bumi moved one of his boulder-balls into the path of Toph's staff, catching it as she twirled, knocking her skywards, and then into the mud. Snarling now, the pair stood up, ready for something ferocious to start. But the announcer moved in on this, to enforce an agreement the adversaries barely remembered making.

"The agreed-upon time for this round is called!"

Bumi's attendants were on him, almost having to pull him out of the arena as the benders cleaned it up. As though to remind him not all was forgiven, Lady Telen's attendants saw to his young opponent. Some water and some noodles in light broth were all the combatants would permit themselves to take in as the battle resumed.

"Tell her I'm not backing down one little bitty bit."

"Oh, noooo. He is going down so hard, Lady Oma's grandkids will feel it."

The audience stared in wonder, knowing that the drain the spectacular stunts they'd seen earlier had caused in the combatants meant there would not be a repeat show. For those particular routines, they would be right. Bumi pointed.

"Aujiakaid Battle!"

Toph grinned, and wiped her mouth.

"You're on!"

The audience became more than just a little concerned.

"An Aujiakaid battle?"

"That could wreck the city!"

One member was still lost.

"Hey-that guy she mentioned before? I thought his name was pronounced Soak-a."

His friend shook his head, and seemed on the verge of tears.

"Emdusk, you're not helping."

Emdusk harumphed.

"Jerk. I'll have you know the Ember Island Players accepted my script for a sequel to 'Boy In The Iceberg'."

Those in the audience who knew this man found it easy to ignore him and focus back on the battle. Bumi moved swirling piles of sand, and crafted them into the image of a legendary great beast, something so fierce and powerful, even the Lion-Turtles respected them.

" Aujiakaid - Giant Strange Creature - Gorilla-Whale-who is called, in the tales of Oauto Island, KUJIRA!"

The Kujira, with its sloping head dominated by huge fangs, its reptilian tail and huge arms and legs, somehow roared and let loose a spray of terrain-destroying sand, which it sucked up with a reverse roar, sounding like an entire herd of Appas if their sound could be taken in backwards.

"A weak monster for a weak king. Aujiakaid-Bat-Dragon, said to have ridden a meteor to our world, from space, I call upon The Eld Destructor, TRICEPHALOS!"

Toph showed that what Mai had warned Bumi of was true. Sand and the blind bender were now very good friends. Tricephalos rose in all his ghastly glory, complete with three-heads and two tails. The middle head was made of metal. Toph did not spray sand in the arena. Instead, her creatures heads sprayed lightning. As everyone else gasped, and Bumi tried not to, Toph shrugged this off.

"Rubbing lodestones together makes pretty sparks, doesn't it?"

The two behemoths prepared to move against each other, while their wielders fought off waves of pure exhaustion neither would even admit to themselves. But this would not be a worry. Instead of declaring the second round's official start, the announcer called out an urgent warning.

"Non-combatants in the ring! Match suspended until they are clear."

Lord Valtin, Lady Shira, Mai and Tom-Tom were indeed now in the center of the combat area, laying out a blanket and unpacking some food. Shira looked over at the fighting pair and waved.

"Red Potato Salad!"

Bumi and Toph let their Aujiakaids crumble to the ground, and walked over. Bumi looked at the man he'd aided these past months.

"Valtin, what in bloody blue blazes are ya doin?"

Valtin moved Tom-Tom away from the dessert cakes as he responded.

"Why, having a picnic, of course. We brought plenty-including Kantuk Region Fried Pheasant-Hen."

Bumi briefly thought of a drumstick in one hand, gravied biscuits in the other one, till he remembered to be angry. Toph walked up to Mai.

"You said you weren't going to try and talk me out of this."

Mai opened up the pickled cabbage.

"I said I wouldn't try to stop you. This isn't trying. This is doing."

"Now listen up all of you-"

"We are going to have this fight no matter what you bunch-"

Mai held up her smiling little brother to his favorite people outside the family.

"Look, big guy-it's To-To and Uncle Boom. Guys-just tell Tom-Tom whatever it is you were going to say to us."

If they had agreed on nothing else, the pair agreed about this intervention.

"Dirty Billiards, people."

"What he said."

Poli and Aedren walked up, not wanting to arrest the people who had grown on them, but facing a hard choice. Poli shook his head.

"Listen, this may not be much of a way to settle things. But the people need closure. King Bumi may not be able to rule here anymore, without a victory in this Agni Kai. How can folks from the Fire Nation move this way to stop something of their own tradition?"

Mai took point on this, and did so gladly.

"And may I CONGRATULATE the great people of Omashu for importing the single stupidest tradition my nation ever put forward. The man I love lost part of his face to this idiocy."

Toph was at the ready.

"And he also, ya know-uhh-gained effective rulership of the world that way too?"

"Kid has a fair point. These things can also clear the air. Your boyfriend certainly saw the plus side of this combat."

Mai was resolute.

"Yeah, well, he also has nightmares about it. A dear friend of ours nearly killed. Bad blood or no, his sister falling straight into insanity before his eyes. A world that he must rule effectively and also wisely end his rule of in a tight timeframe now straight on his head, along with the comb. Talk all you want about results. I'll never be a fan."

"And that gives you the right to interfere with matters you have no part in?"

Mai surprised nearly all by walking up and embracing the blind bender-albeit very briefly before pulling back.

"I'm one of the group now, Toph. If either of you got hurt while I just watched, Katara and the others would hate me, and I would understand why. Besides, you're the member of the group who understands uptight, anal mothers and fathers who just don't get it..."

Shira rolled her eyes while holding Tom-Tom and whispered.

"We're right here, Mai dear..."

"...even if I'm currently doing better than you on that front. Now listen, you jerk! I'm new to this having friends thing. So forgive me if I'm a little selfish about keeping the ones I know alive and well."

She turned and looked at Bumi.

"As to you-you gave your wannabe conquerors a home and an essential pardon. You-all of you here-have performed a miracle, and given me the parents I always wanted. But King Bumi? I really doubt that a city ruled by a more conventional king would be so open to not throwing my folks out or in the stockade. So don't expect me to just go away when your life is on the line, either. And don't tell me it isn't-I know what an Agni Kai's about. It's basically a lot of hot air followed by a lot of hurting. My own ancestor may have robbed the world of the greatest Air Nomad of all time. I aided a woman who wanted the world and all who live in it as a plaything. I once believed in exporting our culture to every corner of the world. Well, I no longer believe in that, and of all the things in our culture I despise, this type of combat is the one I hate most. It was used by a father to legally disfigure his own son, mostly because that son was born first, much like the brother that father envied and hated. Is that the legacy you want the Earth Kingdom to copy?"

Before the uneasy audience could take Mai's words in, Valtin spoke to the people that were now his.

"You have a good thing here. Don't throw it away for one bad day at the end of a harsh war. Now, I'll admit, Bumi can be childish, mercurial, pushy, uncommunicative, arrogant, dense, insensitive..."

Bumi sneered.

"Hey, Valtin? Is this coming to a 'But' anytime soon?"

"...interruptive, and frankly, he needs to work on some new jokes. But, have no doubt, the work he did in Ba Sing Se was for the sake of all, and especially Omashu. My people needed to have their greatest and most recent war-prize taken from them, on the same day the Avatar broke Ozai and Zuko broke Azula, details aside. People, including myself, have wondered why this time of goodwill has come and stayed as long as it has. I therefore choose to credit the Pai Sho Masters for a large part of this. For through these three defeats the Fire Nation was shown that, with its most vicious rulers, greatly enhanced powers, and months of meticulous planning, all their victories of a hundred years could be taken from them in the course of a single day. Ozai was not enough. Azula was not enough. Even the Fleet, taken apart by this powerful girl and my daughter's ally in protecting the new Fire Lord, was not enough. Without Ba Sing Se, there would be rogue army units. There would be generals and admirals openly defying Zuko's rule, and some declaring themselves the new RFL. Ba Sing Se closed the circle on the rope they had been placing around their own necks. To keep from choking, they finally had to cut the rope they had tried to lasso the whole world with. No noise from the defeated Fire Nation meant and means that everyone else can safely stand down, and only in that can there be even a hint of forgiveness. I credit the brilliant young people and the wise Old Masters for their continued efforts, but it is from the common people that the decision to have peace must originate. People of Omashu-you have a challenging King, but you have a good one. In this light, I will ask the young lady who created metal-bending, and who smiles openly only when caring for my little son-to stand down from her challenge."

Toph threw up her arms.

"How many times do I have to say it? I don't want the throne. I was going to give it back two seconds after Bumi told me what I wanted to know."

Shira added her two cents in.

"Did it never occur to you that, once you had beaten him, his further rule might be impossible?"

Toph actually fell silent for thirty seconds.

"That-didn't occur to me-at all. Umm-maybe I was taking out my stuff with my parents on Bumi for being an inconsiderate jerk?"

Mai nodded.

"Gee, you think?"

Toph blew her hair-lock away from her forehead.

"The challenge is withdrawn-IF I get an answer."

An entire city shifted its eyes-and ears-to Bumi. He winced.

"Geez, that's creepy. DON'T DO THAT!"

The old master sighed.

"It's-it's like this..."

The embarrassment on his face and in his voice was plain.

"I was trained and my way of doing things was formed before anyone knew this war would take a hundred years. I can honestly say that my first masters were among the greatest our bent will ever see. Didn't matter if they were young or old, male or female, or what corner of this world they came from or had moved to. They were the best. They'dve loved you, girlie. They had your inventiveness. I could never go creative, so I went wild. I met up with my masters' level, and I exceeded them, one and all. But not being creative-"

Toph interjected, almost despite herself.

"I think you're creative. Really creative."

The gasps that followed this quickly gave way to sighs of relief that the impasse had been navigated.

"I mean-I didn't prepare myself to fight an idiot. A jerk, maybe, but not an idiot."

The break in the ice was widened vastly when Bumi gently mussed Toph's hair.

"Thanks, kid. But I have to be honest-when it comes to bending, brains I got-the spark? Not so much. When I was learning, I just kept doing stupid stuff until I hit on something smart. My whole 'Muscle Up' thing? Came from overdosing on certain minerals from a spa bath one of my masters recommended. Heh. I was always doing things like that, and my teachers, bless em', encouraged me. The chute-rides, they came-"

The man actually seemed his age for a brief moment and tears were obviously being struggled with.

"-came from playing around with a boy I loved like my own brother, and who, when he went away-what's that thing they call 'arrested development'? Cause I like, own that."

Gathering himself, Bumi kept on with his story.

"Through it all I maintained my dream - to be the one who crossed the line that no Earth-Bender ever had - to make metal flow in our hands."

Toph now sounded almost grave.

"And I took it away from you."

Bumi snarked back at her depressed tone.

"Don't be stupid, girlie! I killed my dream. And I killed it because I always respect my teachers. My teachers-who said it could never be done. No matter what twists and tweaks and ideas I proposed, they kept hewing to that ancient line. Even, as I grew to be a master myself, I always heard their voices whenever I tried to figure out metal-bending, including the toughest lady this side of Kyoshi who once flatly informed me that continuing to pursue this showed contempt for those who had spent so much time giving me what I had. So I decided that these revered, innovative masters were right and accepted that this overgrown boy was wrong. I-I gave up. By Papa Samaurufu, I Hate Giving Up!"

Telen nodded.

"I remember the day you did. You looked so sad, it finally drove me to confess my feelings for you-things moved quickly from there."

Bumi looked at his wife, however many years they'd been apart.

"For you two, I wanted to grow the hell up. I think maybe I came to resent you later, for how you came to me when I had just put away my toys. That's me all over, though. I handled Toph the same way. Because I had to learn metal-bending before I die, even if I knew I had nothing to provide in return. Because my pride wouldn't let me say it."

He looked down.

"I don't care who got there first. I would have liked it to be me, but that's life. I hate that it was always possible, and that I stopped trying because for one stupid moment, I stopped believing in the impossible. I don't mind being seen as a flighty jerk, Toph. But it hurts even now to admit out loud that I was just this big quitter."

Mai feared that Toph would snark about 'pity parties' and use variant phrases of 'get over it'. But that is not what happened.

"So you believe in the impossible? Maybe-maybe that was your problem."

Bumi realized gesturing was out here.

"Go on."

Toph appeared to be thinking something over.

"Well, it sounds like your folks wanted a wide-open education for you. The world was your quarry, so to speak."

"That's-pretty much right."

Bumi saw Toph smile, subject matter aside.

"My folks-as I've probably whined on by now a billion times-were the exact opposite. The world they wanted for me was an ever-shrinking cage. They really meant well, but it infuriated me. Finally, when those two lame-o's had me in that metal box, I felt like my parents might never let me out of it, since they now had a small enough cage that I could never escape."

Bumi shook his head.

"But you busted out of that thing. Recreated the Earth Bent in that one moment."

Toph shrugged.

"Don't you get it? You didn't create metal-bending because you never needed to. Your world was open, and metal was something you could come back to at any time. Mine was closed, and the metal was up in my face. Your teachers may have been the greats, but it sounds like they talked a lot. Me? I learned from the badger-moles. Sweet natured, very instructive-but not the greatest conversationalists. Get it? There was no one to teach me the line between possible and impossible-at least in bending. In life, my parents managed that very well."

Shira took Mai's hand, and squeezed it while responding to Toph.

"Some parents, when they receive the blessing of a child, forget that they are the blessed, and not the ones who give blessings."

As Mai blushed, Valtin eyed Bumi to nudge him to say something to Toph. The King finally found the words.

"So-you staying? I'd hate to lose the best sparring partner I've had since what's-his-face-ya know, kid with the Tattoo, doesn't write for a whole century?"

Toph breathed in.

"Well, I like the taste of this air. Good mix of minerals, and sediment. Each town and city tastes different, ya know. The Fire Nation Capital tastes..."

Bumi loudly interrupted.

"Hold The Messenger! You mean to say you can TASTE the earth in the air?"

"Wasn't I just saying that?"

Bumi slapped his forehead.

"Ehhhh...couldn't you call tasting the earth for a form of, I don't know-CONTACT!?"

The eyes of the city now shifted to Toph, who felt the heat from their glares.

"Wow-that is creepy. So-I guess if I had kept my cool and figured that out during your lessons, we could have avoided all this..."

Toph gulped.

"Ummm-I apologize for reading everything as some continuation of my folks' control-freak natures?"

Quiet assent for the apology went up quickly, and as the crowd dispersed, the sheer spectacle of the battle, and bets on who might have come out on top, were heard, as were worrying talks that maybe Bumi should still step down. But since this was no longer angry talk, this was taken as good enough for the moment. The King called a triumph feast in his own way.

"Party At My Place!"

Away from the combat arena they went, till only Mai and Toph remained. Toph figured things out very quickly.

"You invited them, didn't you?"

Mai looked up in the sky.

"As insurance, in case Tom-Tom wasn't enough. But they are a busy bunch. Maybe they never got the message. Well, let's eat."

"Good-with me."

Fifteen minutes after everyone was relaxing and enjoying themselves at the feast, a lone figure slammed into the battlefield. Whirling his glider now like a staff, he cried out words with all the sacred authority he could muster.

"This combat must end! I can't believe two of my best friends would fight it out like common barbarians over ego and wounded pride! Stop this now, or I will never forgive you! Fighting like this is pointless and just plain stupid!"

He slipped into his legendary state, and his voice echoed like thunder in the valley.

"HEED NOW THE WORDS OF AVATAR AANG! THIS COMBAT IS OVER! EVERYONE-"

His eyes darted around. He saw the empty arena. He slipped out of his legendary state, his head turning in every direction till he started to become dizzy. Again, he cried out.

"Hey! Where is everybody?"

Still a good distance away, a flying bison carried people who had tried to advise the Avatar to wait till they were closer to Omashu to make his move.

For the record, the next time this sort of thing came up, he listened.

(To Be Concluded)


	5. Chapter 5

OMASHU

To say that Avatar Aang was embarrassed was an understatement.

"Nobody was there. I had a speech prepared and everything."

Still, he tried to be happy that the conflict between Bumi and Toph had been settled without his intervention.

"Guess we don't need old Aang anymore, do we?"

His supportive friends gave him what they had.

"Guess you should look before you leap, eh, Twinkletoes?"

They showed that they understood entirely.

"Really, Aang? You try to take my job? There is only one Sokka. Accept no substitutes."

The girl he loved was right by his side.

"You were-hahahaheh-shouting at the top of your lungs-HEY WHERE IS EVERYBODY? for what must have been twenty minutes-hhehehahha!"

The ruler of much of the world, his friend and ally in the great fight to save that world, his own past incarnation's descendant, showed what he was made of in this low moment.

"I mean, it never occurred to you that there were no noises from the combat arena?"

The woman who was the great love of that man's life was her usual stoic self.

"I'm not going to laugh at you."

The Avatar looked up at her with grateful eyes.

"Thanks, Mai."

She shrugged.

"I mean, I made my little speech about blatant stupidity, but you? You brought the point home like no one's business."

Aang seemed on the verge of going all Kyoshi on his assembled associates.

"Anyone else? Why am I suddenly the talk of Omashu town?"

Bumi slapped his boyhood friend on the back, so hard his chakras nearly misaligned.

"Because you're a convenient target, ya dolt! Accept your time of utter unfair ridicule with some grace, Oh Chosen One."

Aang sincerely tried, and also vowed to get even in a hideous manner with every last one of them. He recalled a windy stretch of mountain passage that Appa loved-and his passengers always had nightmares about.

"So-the bad blood is really done with?"

Toph nodded.

"I got my answer and my lessons. In fact, Bumi thinks-"

She whispered while Sokka again hit the buffet table.

"-that he can use my meteor fragment to track down whatever's left of Sokka's sword."

Aang almost regretted hearing that. While the sword was well-forged and anything was possible, the height from which it had fallen seemed to preclude its being found intact, or perhaps even salvageable. Bumi explained the concept.

"For most types of earth, this technique isn't so great. They're too common, and trying to say, find sand can leave you with a nasty headache from the massive presence the stuff has. But the rarer the element, the more its signature can be isolated. Presuming the sword wasn't pulverized on impact, we have a good chance of giving Sokka something to try and reforge."

There was a shift in the demeanor of his oldest friend. Aang wouldn't quite call it maturity, both because this was Bumi, after all, and he feared the King's wrath if he were to use the 'M' word around the overgrown child. But Bumi's child had his interest.

"Oma? What's it like having him for a Dad?"

Oma smiled, and Aang again saw that this woman took some of her looks from her father.

"Avatar-I'm really hoping to find out. But its great meeting you. All my childhood, I heard stories about your childhood. I don't doubt my Dad's commitment, but-well, he is still Bumi of Omashu. Life with him can't help but be an adventure."

She would find only good things in this, but that was in the future. In the present, one friend gave another some perspective on recent news from her estranged home.

"Sokka, you have to know I don't really want to talk about this, at all. Ever."

"Toph-you know I'm at least savvy enough to not go there without having something good to tell you."

Toph couldn't roll her ears, but Sokka was making her think of ways to do this.

"Go ahead."

Sokka's excitement was for his friend, but it was also all too apparent in his voice.

"All right. Ummm-doesn't your family only really marry within a certain field of potential spouses?"

Toph knew exactly what he was asking.

"It's okay to say it, Sokka. When it comes to dedicated inbreeding, the Bei Fong Clan could give the Swamp-Benders a run for their money-if they had money-or ya know, used money-or had a concept of money."

Sokka nodded.

"Remember, you said it-I didn't. Well, what if I told you that it's possible that your blindness was a result of this?"

This time, Toph didn't get it at all.

"I have sixteen cousins, Sokka. Most of them are stuck-up girls, and the boys I do not like one bit. Besides my outcast status and my eyes, I have no plans to marry another Bei Fong."

For all his intelligence, Sokka would only much later in life realize that gestures like waving his hand dismissively were beyond pointless around Toph.

"Not what I was getting at. See-umm-Hear, it's like this. The way the Mechanist and his friends described it to me at the North Pole, your ancestors all must have had a slight trait that could lead to a child of theirs having sight problems. But when they only married among each other, that trait became magnified-random chance suddenly became a lot less random and a lot more likely."

Toph started to follow his reasoning and the path of his logic.

"Like mixing a bowl with berries and nuts, but eating only one and not the other, till the one you didn't eat is almost all there is to choose from."

Sokka let the holes in her analogy slide, acknowledging the thin ice he was on.

"Sort of. But in this case, we're more talking about growing nuts and berries, and only the variety they most liked. To keep the crops healthy, you should change it up a bit. You understand?"

Toph shook her head.

"Nope. You lost me, Sokka. And now I'm hungry for nuts and berries-presuming Aang hasn't eaten them all."

He simply stated the facts as he knew them, stowing build-up.

"Toph, your parents can try and have all the replacement children they want. But the odds are good that what made you blind will make your little brothers and sisters blind, too. The spirits may play dice with our lives, but dice only have so many rolls in them, and your ancestors fixed their dice by growing a family tree with very few branches. Was that a good analogy? I've been working on them...what's wrong?"

Toph looked sad.

"My parents fired most of the servants who were willing to let me do my own thing. You just told me my little sibs will end up just like me. They're gonna be even more restricted than I ever was."

Sokka hugged a girl who was now largely, but not entirely, over her crush on him.

"Heck, No. They're gonna have you. You make yourself a presence in their lives, Toph. Trust me, people need a good sister. And you will be the second best sister in this whole world."

A slap came across Sokka's back.

"Katara? Why'd you do that? I just called you the world's best sister."

The waterbender was showing signs of waterworks.

"You made me cry, you stupid jerk!"

Sokka got his own hug, after which Toph sighed.

"The universe does have him in its sights, doesn't it?"

Toph heard Iroh talking to a party-goer in a voice that indicated offense.

"I can assure you, young man, that it is NOT pronounced _'E-roh'. _Now please don't interrupt my tea-drinking again."

The inquisitive man's friend dragged him off as he asked if it had been a great honor to meet the Moon Spirit. Toph then took something from the fact that almost everyone she knew was there.

"General? Who's minding the store back in the Fire Nation?"

Iroh quickly realized that Toph did not mean his Tea Shop.

"Well, Toph-be assured that a lady of noble blood is acting as regent in my nephew's absence."

THE FIRE LORD'S PALACE

"Alright! I want to see smiles. We lost a war, not our face muscles."

She looked about, glaring at each palace attendant, most of whom nervously gave in and smiled as she directed. But it wasn't enough. The most resistant guard found his face locked into a grin by means of a mere touch.

"I said-SMILE!"

Many there hoped the regime of Regent Ty Lee would soon pass.

OMASHU

Mai again made a quiet apology, and again it was brushed off, though not in a contemptuous way.

"Hey, it was war, alright? She may be insane, but she was also an insanely good warrior. If we had been better, we would have been able to stand up to you three. As a result of that defeat, we have gotten a lot better. Ty Lee's had trouble teaching her chi-blocking to us, but she's done a stellar job showing us how to avoid being totally paralyzed."

Mai always had doubts about Azula, but her leadership in facing down the Kyoshi Warriors was exemplary and even admirable. Like always, just as the Fire Princess seemed to be showing positive traits, the ones that made Mai begin to rethink her commitment came right up.

"Suki, I'd like us to be friends. Sokka has stood by Zuko and his advice has made managing this peace a real possibility. I just have to be sure that there are no hard feelings-for when she ordered us to strip you and your team. Dignity is a big deal to me. Like you say, war is war. But that kind of deliberate humiliation never sat well. Whatever I did for Azula willing or otherwise, I hated her for how much she loved to reduce people."

Suki seemed to almost hug herself, as though embarrassed.

"I was half-awake, even when Ty Lee hit me. I seem to recall you telling Azula that the male soldiers in your entourage should leave. You even made her think that it was her idea."

Mai shook her head.

"Well, that was never difficult. The woman wielded lightning, and I swear she thought she made the weather happen. Can you tell me how the infiltration is going?"

It was an abrupt shift, but since the business of that past battle was now both done with and distinctly uncomfortable for both women, Suki went right to the new subject.

"I can only reveal certain details to Zuko or possibly to Aang, if the danger level is high. But I can tell you right now, it isn't. The soldiers we've talked to are glad to be home, mostly. The mid-ranking officers seem content as well, most of them being sick of the politicking that went with wartime advancement. A few high-rankers are talking coup, but they can't find any followers, so they get drunk a lot and look very pathetic."

Mai liked what she was hearing, but it didn't feel right.

"What about the Earth Kingdom?"

If Suki had regrets about spying on her own people, she kept those away from her face and voice with a restraint Mai envied.

"The colonies and the regions bordering them seem less concerned with Zuko restoring their sovereignty and more frightened that a sudden Fire Nation pull-out would mean an influx of thugs and bandits. One merchant actually told me that Zuko would face their ire if he pulled any more soldiers out."

Again, Mai heard good news that she didn't quite understand.

"Not getting that at all. Why wouldn't they want their own soldiers instead of the conquering armies, even after a century in some places?"

Suki shrugged.

"The war took its toll. The siege of Ba Sing Se ate up a lot of their best military minds. Many others became tools of the Dai Li's enforcement regime, and are no longer trusted. Apparently, the mercenary types that Zuko met and fought in that one village by the Plains became typical as Earth Kingdom recruitment in many places scraped the bottom of the barrel. Sokka's advice had Zuko in effect leaving only his very best, dedicated professional soldiers who really see protecting all the people in their charge as a given. Those of the Fire Nation who wanted to go home, went quickly; those who were scamming or bullying left because it was only the reluctant recruits that gave them the numbers to ply their trade. They joined with some bandit groups, but we clobbered those in the Ruins."

Mai was never one for holding back, and she didn't start now.

"Suki, why isn't all this good news making either of us happy?"

They both knew why. All of their extended group did. Trying to race ahead of the invisible, unstated deadline when the relief and exhaustion of the war's end, and the economic boost and novelty of free trade would all expire was actually tasking them worse than any true enemy could. Even a foe as brilliant and cunning as Azula could be planned against. A siege could be broken; a conspiracy exposed, an assassin foiled. But how one could prevail against the unguessable moment when these favorable conditions changed, especially when the loss of any one of them might be enough to erase the effects of all the others?

Major changes were needed in this makeshift status quo, and they were needed soon. Two Kings and an Avatar were discussing just that. Bumi heard what he thought was good news. Like with other such good news, it had its drawbacks. Fire Lord Zuko heard news he had awaited since the second the war ended.

"You found Kuei at last? Aang, that's fantastic! When he is coming back to Ba Sing Se?"

Aang breathed in.

"Bumi, Zuko-Kuei is never coming back."

THE YESREJ ARCHIAPELAGO

Aang saw Kuei atop a hill in this very far-off place, and landed excitedly. Kuei smiled, but did not stir from his leisurely position.

"Congratulations, Avatar, on a victory well-earned. I'm also told that the new Fire Lord is as different a man as could be hoped for, when compared to his fallen fathers."

Aang almost wanted to shake Kuei, but kept his calm for the moment.

"Earth King, you must get back to Ba Sing Se. Your people need you. Zuko is incredibly anxious to yield back your throne to you, and figure out how to handle the colonies."

Kuei actually had a piece of straw in his mouth as he lay back against a tree.

"Have you actually been to the colonies, Avatar? They almost govern themselves. The Fire Folk are less arrogant, and the Earth Folk less defiant. The Earth is Warm There. That's what they like to say. Do you know how I got here? By way of a tramp steamer that was once a small warship purchased by its former Fire Nation crew. They fished and sang in all the areas that would have once had them court-martialed or killed for merely entering. Heh-heh. The world may be saved from vengeance-trading by sheer exhaustion and the simple joys of living."

Aang was tired, and on more levels than he cared to admit, so he sat down.

"I've been hearing that a lot. But your Majesty-this time can't last."

"It's Kuei-Aang. And why can't it last? Are you and your heroic group now so cynical that you doubt the desire of the common folk to put all this nonsense aside?"

Aang in fact was at least a bit more cynical than he had started out as.

"It only takes one schemer, Kuei. Then suddenly, the Fire Nation wants revenge for its defeat, and everyone else wants revenge on them for the war. This time of good feelings needs order to back it up and keep it going. Part of that order is forged by having a stable Earth Kingdom with its legitimate ruler in place."

Kuei only seemed to be paying partial attention.

"Ahhh-the twins are here."

Two bear cubs, looking like darker-furred versions of Bosco, came bounding up, licking and poking Kuei with their noses. One sniffed Aang, and proceeded to smother him with bear-kisses and hugs.

"Kuei? You found Bosco a mate?"

"These aren't their cubs, but, Yes. Though it's more like he found her. He sniffed this island, and the steamer dropped us off here. They wanted to see how far the island chain stretched. I'm with my only real family here, Aang. And - its where I'm going to spend the rest of my life. I've seen too much of an open world to ever rule from a safe shrine anymore. Please understand."

Aang's calm now vanished. He got in Bumi's face.

"Fire Lord Zuko is now my close friend. He already faces an awesome burden. The last thing he wants is to cement the gains his family's sins created, to reward their savagery with default victory. I won't let your irresponsibility create any more problems for him!"

Aang took his voice down again, but his fury was still apparent.

"Kuei, I ran away on the eve of this war. That may have been the plan of the spirits, and maybe I would have just been killed with Monk Gyaotso and the others. But what I chose to do I have regretted ever since. I love my life now, and especially my friends-but I have to live with the harsh truths of my cowardice and fear. However many I help now, that's how many more I hurt by my choice to run. If you don't take your throne back, what happens after will be your fault."

Kuei shooed the twins back to their approaching parents as he responded.

"There is only one Avatar, and you were a boy, overwhelmed by the choices of grown men who thought they could push you into action. There are other rulers, including one who is, by all reports, doing just fine without me. I have prepared two scrolls for Lord Zuko, the first of which formally yields The Enduring Throne to him. Will you take them to him?"

Aang glared at the former King with all his might. Kuei asked a new question.

"Will you force me to go back?"

OMASHU

Aang's choice didn't sit well with one there.

"The people of Ba Sing Se and the Earth Kingdom are going to say Zuko killed Kuei or banished him. By letting him scamper off and watch his bear mate, you've made the new Fire Lord look like the people he supposedly replaced!"

Zuko calmed Mai.

"Aang did the right thing, Mai. Kuei was in a bad position because of Long Feng's scheming. He never really ruled. Was never really trained for it. I hate his choice-though I can't help but sympathize with him. This all gets to be a bit much. If I could, I'd take the island next to Kuei's, grab all the people we care about, and we'd all live like Katara and Sokka's people."

Mai winced.

"No offense to our friends-but that's a bit much."

Sokka almost dropped his food-tray.

"Yeah, that is a bit much."

Katara surprisingly agreed.

"Our ways are good for us in that place. But you can go too simple."

Zuko got back on track.

"All that aside, we have an answer from Kuei. That helps all by itself, though it's not the answer we wanted, and it's also not an option. If I claim the Enduring Throne, the people will see it as a power grab, and they would be right. Yet if there is no ruler in Ba Sing Se, we could eventually face the same problem."

Sokka pointed at Iroh.

"How about Unc? He's a hero of the liberation, and a business owner of a well-liked shop."

Iroh gently shot down the notion.

"If, Sokka, we would face a revolt at the Fire Lord also becoming the Earth King, do you think it would be any wiser for him to appoint his uncle, who is also remembered for a long draining siege? Besides, I also sympathize with Kuei to some degree, and taking the throne would mean giving up my tea shops in the two capitols."

In fact, Iroh would be a prime source of material support to his nephew in this situation. Zuko had already ruled out Iroh as an option. Katara also seemed at a loss.

"It can't be Aang. Even if the spirits would allow it, it would taint the Avatar's position as being of all four Nations."

Aang shook his head.

"I really couldn't. And we have to face facts - there are only two nations. My people are dead. The Water Tribes, even the Northern, could barely stay independent as the war dragged on. If the solution and the restoration of balance does not start first and foremost with the Fire Nation and the Earth Kingdom, then all we've done is for nothing."

Toph made a surprising suggestion.

"Well, how about Sokka?"

This time, Sokka did drop his tray.

"Little lady, you got me a good one, there. I almost believed you."

Toph created a stone seat, and forced him into it.

"I'm totally serious. The guy's smart, he doesn't take himself seriously but he does whatever he can to help. He has the respect of the Fire Nation soldiers who you're still gonna need for the time being, and he is best friends to both the new Fire Lord and the Avatar. His sister brought down the Princess who took Ba Sing Se and tore down its walls. He's Water Tribe, so no one can say he's gonna give the Fire Nation all it wants. In him, all Four Bents are united, by friendship and family. I give you-Earth King Sokka!"

Sokka was beet red from blushing at Toph's endorsement, and when all were silent, Toph sought to be seconded by one she had recently befriended.

"Mai? Please tell our gasping assemblage that Sokka ruling-would rule."

Sokka almost gave Mai a look of pleading to be snarked out of this position. Though the result would be all the same, that wasn't what Mai did at all.

"It would rule. I am convinced Sokka could not only restore the people's faith in Zuko's promise, but that he could guide that advanced backwater into the new era, as it leaves the isolation of those walls behind. But I guess this is a day for selfishness. Because I do not want to see Sokka on the Enduring Throne. I want him right where he has been. By the side of the man I love, advising him and helping reform a military that too often saw thuggish behavior as a plus. Aang can't be constantly by his side-his responsibility is to the world and to rebuilding it. Katara needs to be by Aang's side. But I need Sokka to be by Zuko's side-because I won't be."

Zuko's head turned fast enough for everyone to hear a crack.

"Are we breaking up again-again?"

Mai cupped his cheek. This would be hard.

"No-way. You and I made certain choices before I hopped Appa to get here. I'm holding you to them, and I want you to hold me. And-To-them. To-those-choices. That-we-made."

Toph channeled a bit of Azula at this.

"Smooth, girl."

Since a glare wouldn't help much, Mai actually growled lightly before resuming.

"See, I came here to find out my family's fate, and I found out that they're doing just fine. Better than ever. They're staying in Omashu, and now I want to be a part of something I once only wanted to be apart from. I mean, how would you feel if you suddenly found your family were now entirely different from how you once knew them, and were finally people you could talk to and relate with?"

Zuko didn't miss a beat.

"Amazed."

Aang added in.

"I'd suspect a trap. Well, actually, I'd _expect_ a trap."

Mai realized the stretch her analogy had made had caused it to snap.

"Okay-not a great comparison. But do you understand how I feel, and why I have to stay?"

He kissed her, and then cupped both her cheeks.

"You chose love over fear, at the Boiling Rock. Here in Omashu, I choose love and trust. But I want your word that you will come back to me-and that on that day-"

The politics entered his mind. Critics would say he should have waited until they were back home before he said this. Like so many other times in his life, Zuko's heart prevailed.

"-and on that day, you will formally agree to become my wife."

The sharp eyes of a dour girl almost melted in their sockets, or so it seemed.

"Go and fix the world. Then-you better marry me, or I will Agni Kai your cute butt. Got me?"

"Gotcha, Fire Lady Mai."

The cheers went up quickly, but Toph brought matters back to reality.

"The Fire Lord has a future Fire Lady, and I'm happy for them both. But we still don't have an Earth King, and judging by how much Sokka's sweating, he's gonna do what Mai asked. So what do we do about Ba Sing Se?"

The problem seemed beyond solution for that day. But one last party saw a path to changing the game.

"May I speak?"

Bumi shrugged at Valtin.

"You're not gonna bother asking for permission to attend the wedding, are you?"

Valtin raised a finger in the air.

"Why not? My wife is already planning it in her head."

Shira did indeed seem lost in her own mental world, but bristled when called out.

"Just the bridal shower for now!"

Valtin spoke again.

"No, King Bumi. That wasn't why I asked to speak. I believe I have the answer you are searching for, as regards the 53rd Earth King."

Everyone seemed to go silent and turn towards Valtin as he continued. Bumi gestured.

"Well, get on with it. Who's going to Ba Sing Se, in your little plan?"

Valtin pointed at the King Of Omashu.

"You are."

Either through wanting to hear more or being stunned, the crowd allowed Valtin the floor.

"You are the direct descendant of a past Earth King. By rights, the throne is yours anyway. You aided Ba Sing Se's liberation as well, but unlike General Iroh, you are likely only seen as a liberator. You could directly aid-and I doubt you would be kept back from-the partial restoration of Na Sing Se to truly being Ba Sing Se, by raising up its walls once more, or at least to some degree. Best of all, you are not being made a King. You are one."

Bumi was a man who knew his reign in Omashu had a checkered record. But he rejected what Valtin said.

"Nice idea. But I've abandoned these folks one too many times. Asked them to be patient once too often. And it's not just them. I have a wife and a daughter who probably don't have any forgiveness left, and uprooting them is not something I want to ask. You're saying I'd be good rebuilding the Impenetrable City. I just want to rebuild my place with my family."

Lady Telen inserted herself in this.

"I think-it would be a wonderful idea. What makes you so sure we wouldn't want to follow you to The Enduring Throne? Even if I didn't love you, you stupid little boy, this has been my dream. Omashu's King becomes the Earth King. Respect for our line at last."

Princess Oma smiled as well.

"Hey-how could I lose? I mean, the last Princess in that city was Azula. I have to look good by comparison. Besides, that witch took my entire wardrobe back with her as a spoil of war. So I want to reign where she only dreamed of it. Not to mention-I'm with Mai on the lure of seeing my family lose the 'dys' and keep the 'function'."

Bumi felt he would miss his kingdom. But if the move would make his woman and his girl happy, he was all for it.

"Still one thing, though. Omashu is pretty far from the capitol. It needs a ruler all its own."

Sokka gestured towards Toph.

"Let's see. Master Earthbender, Check. Noble Blood, Check. Respected by the people she saved from the storage bins, Check. Supported widely in her recent bid to take the throne, Check. A great listener, eyes or no-Check and Checkmate. I give you Queen Toph Of Omashu."

Despite spoken and whispered assent from those in the room, Toph yawned.

"Exactly what part of-Never Wanted The Throne-are all of you not getting?"

Zuko spoke to her directly.

"Toph-you were the one whose trust got me into Team Avatar. Will you trust me now, when I say that you will be a great ruler? And will you help me by letting Bumi be free to take The Enduring Throne?"

She yielded, but only in a limited way.

"It can't be forever. Maybe after Oma and her family have reconnected, she can come back and be Queen. Or something. And-just what is it a ruler does, when they're not a tyrant?"

Bumi scratched his head.

"Well, chiefly, the ruler makes the laws with the help of the people, and then they enforce those laws."

Toph thought it over.

"A Bei Fong in law enforcement? Ooooh-would that ever scandalize my parents. Alright, I'm in!"

Many great changes still lay ahead of them. But the unknowable deadline they dreaded had just taken on a new lease of time. Sokka stood up and bowed.

"Lady Queen-may I please take Suki, Zuko, Mai, Aang, Iroh and Katara to the rooms upstairs to speak?"

"You better stop bowing to me, Sokka! But-thanks for believing in me. Uh-love ya, big guy."

"Same here, lady. Oh-and could you seal off the stairwell after we go up? Sound carries, and this needs to be seriously private."

Toph was almost blushing, but considering how well her last attempt at confessing her past crush on Sokka had gone, she kept it under control.

"Hey-wait a minute. Sokka, you mentioned the spirits earlier. Since when are you a believer?"

Sokka looked troubled, but tried to keep this out of his voice.

"I wouldn't say so much a believer, as less of a total disbeliever. I've seen a lot of stuff that science isn't all there on, and just recently-"

His voice did crack a bit as he finished.

"I may have found out about a genuine miracle."

Sokka gathered his group and headed up, and Toph sealed the door as they went. The Queen went to work.

"First order of business! Lady Shira, may I ask you to craft a scroll for me?"

"Anything for my Queen and babysitter."

Shira handed Tom-Tom off to Bumi, and Oma and Telen tickled and teased the baby as well.

"What is the message to be?"

Toph cracked her fingers.

"To The Esteemed Lord and Lady Bei Fong, from their daughter, the Lady Toph. I look forward to seeing my younger sibling when the time comes. A time of your state visit to my current home will have to be arranged at the earliest possibility, and in this there is no allowable refusal, by the authority vested in me by his majesty, the 53rd Earth King. In other words-"

Toph stood up on her new throne, and shouted for all to hear.

"-MOM AND DAD, I'M THE QUEEN OF OMASHU. YOU GOTTA DEAL WITH IT!"

As Toph spoke words that would echo through time, upstairs, her friends wondered at Sokka's gathering.

"Listen, everyone. I'm a guy who likes to sleep. I'm a guy who likes to joke around. But before I say what I have to, understand in no uncertain terms that I put my back into thinking this through, and that I am completely serious."

Zuko almost seemed offended.

"Hey, man, we trust you."

Aang seconded.

"Yeah, entirely."

Suki had already been told Sokka's incredible news-indeed, her field work had been vital in giving Sokka confidence in his findings. Iroh saw that Sokka's preamble and warning was sincerely given, and so spoke before Katara and Mai could also retort in favor of Sokka's trustworthiness.

"If Sokka is trying to prepare us so thoroughly, I think it would be wise to understand his words of warning and brace ourselves for what he has to say."

"Thanks, Unc. Mai, Sis-Aang, Zuko-I know you have my back on trust and support. But this was way way too big to just blurt out. It affects Aang and Zuko first and last. I wanted the rest of you here to be there for them. So-here it is."

Sokka almost started a routine of humorous analogies, but stopped himself. He spoke in the most straightforward and simple of ways.

"Zuko, I think I know where your Mother is. Where she went to, when she fled the night your father seized power."

One wave of shock hit the room, even to Iroh, who was not braced for this. It was to be only the first such wave. Zuko spoke haltingly.

"Sokka-do you think she's alive?"

"I do. And so are the people who aided her and have been hiding her. This is why I started by saying I wasn't joking. I hope I'm right about this, but, if I am-"

This time, Sokka looked at both Aang and Zuko as he said the words that would challenge one of the central facts of their existence.

"Lady Ursa is with the Air Nomads."

(Next in this Avatar The Last Airbender Story Series : The Bridge 6 : She's Come Undone)


End file.
